PR 4728 
.G8 T3 
1896 
Copy 1 



KfoTOS 













S" 




C_ I 



TALES OF THE MUNSTER FESTIVALS. 



THE AYLMEKS OF BALLY-AYLMER. 

THE HAND AND WORD. 
THE BARBER OF BANTRY, ETC. 

BT 

GERALD GRIFFIN, 

Author of "The Collegians," "Tales of the Munster Festivals," "The 

Rivals," & "Tracy's Ambition," "Tales of the Jury Room," "The 

Dukeof Monmouth," " Tales of the Five Senses," & " Night 

at Sea," " The Invasion," " The Poetical Works," & 

" Tragedy of Gisippus," " Life of Gerald Griffin." 



New York: 
P. J. KENEDY, 

EXCELSIOR PUBLISHING HOUSE, 

5 Barclay Street, 






Copyright, 

D. & J. SADLIER & CO. 

1885. 

BY TRANSFER 
FEB 2| 1«U» 



/t~ : ?Zf?/ 



**- 



V 



"HOILAND-TIDE". 



{Straw for youer gentilesse ! quod our hoste— 
What, Frankeleine ! Parde, Sire, well thou wost 
That eche of you mote tellen at the lest 
A Tale or two, or brekeu his behest. 

COAUQBB 



"Holland-Tide", "All-Hollands", " Hollands-Eve ■ 01 
November-Eve, was once a merrier time in Ireland than it 
is at present, though even still its customary enjoyments 
are by no means neglected. Fortunately for "all the 
Saints , in whose honour the least is celebrated, it occurs 
at a season of the year when the pressure of want is less 
sensibly felt than at most others, and, among a people who 
are, generally speaking, so easily satisfied as to the external 
comforts of life, that a comparative alleviation of suffering 
is hailed with as hearty a welcome as if it were a positive 
acquisition of happiness. The peasant sees, at this period 
at least, the assurance of present abundance around him. 
He beholds a vast extent of land all cultivated, and bur- 
dened with the treasured produce of the soil — gardens of 
stubble covered with shocks of wheat, oats, and barley, 
which look just as if they were intended to make bread 
for him and his neighbours ; fields of potatoes, some in 
which the numerous earthen mounds, or pits* have been 

There is a curious inversion of signification in the words pit, 
ditch . and dyke, in the sister isle. A potato pit is an elevated mound 
of eartn, coiitaiuiug potatoes. A ditch u a dyke, and • dyke mean* 
a ditch. 



It "HOLLAND-TIDE . 

already raised ; others, in which the nipping frost that is 
borne on the November blast has embrowned the stalks 
and withered the Heaves upon their stem. The stroke ot 
ahe flail and the clack of the water-mill are in his ear 
— the meadow land is green and fresh with its aftergrass 
—and the haggart, or hay yard, is stacked into a labyrinth 
with hay and corn. Ho is satisfied with the appearance 
of things about him — he thinks he has no business 
asking himself whether any of these good things are des- 
tined for his use, or for that of a foreign mechanic — he 
never stops to anticipate in fancy, while he puts the spa°de 
for the first time into his own little half acre, and discloses 
the fair produce of his labour, how many calls from 
tithe-proctor, assessed tax-gatherer, landlord, priest, etc., 
may yet diminish his little store : he sees the potatoes ; 
they are his and his pig's by right, and he and his pig are 
merry fellows while they last, and while they can procure 
a turfen fire, or the smoke of a fire, to warm the little 
cabin about them. 

Or, if this last comfort is denied him, he can take his 
stick, and his "God save all here", along with him, and 
make the best of his way into the spacious kitchen of the 
neighbouring "strong farmer", "middle-man", "small gen- 
tleman ", or " half-sir ", when the festival evening above- 
mentioned has arrived. Here he can take his place among 
the revellers, and pay for his warm seat in the chimney 
corner by a joke, a laugh, a tale, a gibe, a magic sleight, a form 
of conjuration proper to the time — in short, by adding his 
subscription of merriment to the general fun of the meeting. 

Just such a quiet, contented, droll fellow, formed one 
of a most frolic November-Eve party at the house of 
a respectable farmer in the west of Munster, upon whose 
hospitality chance threw the collector of these storiea 
on the 31st of last October. The earthen floor had 
been swept as clean as a new pin; the two elderly 
rulers of the mansion were placed side by side in two vene- 



"Holland-tide". 5 

rable, high backed, carved wooden chairs, near a Mazing 
turf fire ; their daughter, a bright-haired Munster lass 
(and Muuster is as remarkable for fair faces, in Ireland, 
as Lancashire in the neighbouring country), all alive with 
epirit and jocund health (that dearest dower of beauty), was 
placed opposite, contending with and far overmatching the 
wits of two rustic beaus, the one the assistant of the village 
apothecary, the other ( the more favoured of the two), a 
wild, noisy, rude, red-faced savage, son to the agent at 
the " great house ", as the mother gave me to understand 
in a whisper. The schoolmaster, the seneschal, half a 
dozen neighbours, and a few shy-looking, rosy-cheeked 
girls, looking forward with most unchristian anxiety and 
credulity to the cabalistic ceremonies of the evening, and 
anxiously longing for the retirement of the scrupulous old 
couple, whose presence alone prevented their being im- 
mediately put in train, in defiance of Father Maney and 
his penances, filled up the remainder of the scene im- 
mediately around the fire — while Paddy, the gorsoon, and 
the two maid-servants, sat whispering together in respectful 
distance, seated in shade upon the settle-bed, at the upper 
end of the apartment. 

Previous to the commencement of the evening sports 
the jolly-looking fellow in the corner before mentioned, 
throwing himself back on his sugan chair, stretching out 
his unstockinged, polished, and marbly legs, variegated by 
the cherishing influence of many a warm fireside, snapped 
his fingers, and made glad the heart of his ancient host, 
by leading out the famous old chorus :— 



'I love ten pence, jolly, jolly ten pence 
I love ten pence better than my life; 
I spent a penny of it, 
I lent a penny of it, 
I took eight pence home to my wife 



I " HOLLAND-TIDI "• 

n. 

I love eight pence, jolly, jolly eight p*nc# 
I love eight pence better than my life) 

I spent a penny of it, 

I lent a penny of it, 
I took six pence home to my wife, 

III. 

I love six pence", etc., etc. 

*nd so forth, to 

" I love two pence, jolly, jolly two pence; 
I love two pence better than my life ; 
I spent a penny of it, 
I lent a penny of it, 
I took M/rii ing home to my wife I" 

The chorus having died away in a most musical dis- 
cord, a clear space was made in the midst, and a fat 
faced little urchin, clambering up on the back of one 
of the high chairs, lowered from the roof a sort of 
apparatus made of two laths crossed, and suspended 
from one of the bacon hooks above by a whip-cord, 
fastened from the centre. A large bag of apples was 
now brought forward from the corner of the room, and 
two of the sleekest and largest affixed to the extremities 
of one of the cross-sticks, while the other was furnished 
with two short bits of candles, lighted. When the balance 
was fairly adjusted, and the whole machine lowered to the 
level of the mouths of the guests, it was sent twirling round 
« ith a touch of the finger ; the fun being now, to see who 
would fix his or her teeth in the immerse apple while in 
rapid motion, and avoid taking, instead, the unwelcome 
inch of lighted caudle, which appeared to be whisking round 
in pursuit. 

" E'then, bad mannners to you, Norry Foley", said the 
merry fellow with the legs before mentioned, addressing 
himself to a modest, blue-eyed, simpering maiden, who ad- 
vanced in her turn to the "snap-apple", with a sly coquet 



" HOLLAND-TIDE". 7 

tish management of lip and eye, "only mark what a weeny 
dawny little mouth she makes at it, because the gintlemin 
is looking at her now, all o' one I hadn't seen her myself 
many's the time make no more than the one offer at a white- 
eye that would make two of that apple". 

And, as if to demonstrate the facility of the undertaking, 
he advanced in his turn with an easy, careless, swaggering 
confidence in his own prowess, and a certain ominous work- 
ing of his immense jaws, which struck awe into the hearts 
of the junior spectators. The orifice which was displayed 
when he expanded them, banished the faintest glimmering 
of hope ; and when they closed, with a hollow sound, upon 
the devoted fruit, a general groan announced that the sports 
and chances of " snap-apple" for that evening were at an end. 

Next followed the floating apple, of still greater dimen- 
sions than the former, placed in a tub of clear water, and 
destined to become the property of him who should, fairly 
between his teeth, and without help from hands or the side 
of the vessel, lift it out of the fluid. This created most up- 
roarious mirth for some time, until the man with the legs, 
in his own quiet, silent way, stalked among the disputants 
like the genius of fate, and picking it ofl" the surface as if 
it had been a walnut, retired to his corner, followed by the 
wondering and envious glances of the gaping juniors. 

While these things were transacted above, another group 
about the fire were occupied more interestingly, though not 
so merrily, in melting the lead through the handle of a key 
placed over a porringer of water, and conjecturing from the 
fantastical shapes which the metal assumed, their own fu- 
ture destiny; in burning the beans* (iu which process, 
much to the dissatisfaction of the young hostess and her 
noisy sweetheart, the village apothecary's lad was observed 
to burn quietly by her side, while the former bounced away 

* Such is the demand for those articles "coming on" November 
Eve, that rural speculators sow beau gardens for the purpose of profit* 
tog by the occasion. 



8 " HOLLAND-TIDE * 

with a " pop!" like a shot), and other Innocent and permit* 
ted arts of the Ephesian letter. These little minor tricks, 
however, were but child's play to the great girls, who were 
on thorns until the field should be left clear to themselves 
— when they might put in practice the darker and more 
daring ceremonies proper to the time — the drying of the 
shift sleeve on the three-legged stool, and watching in the 
silence of the midnight for the shadowy resemblance of the 
future spouse, who was to turn it before the fire ; the sow- 
ing of hemp or rape seed ; the adjuration with a sage-leaf, 
and all the gloomy and forbidden mysteries of the night, 
into which we shall not at present penetrate ; these ceremo- 
nies not being peculiar or strictly national, and having 
already found admirable historians in the authors of " Hal- 
loween ", and of " The Boyne Water ". 

After the company had wearied their spirits and memo- 
ries in search of new matter of amusement, and exhausted 
all the accustomed festivities of the evening, the loudness 
of their merriment began to die away, and a drowsiues3 
crept upon their laughter and conversation. As the noisier 
revellers grew comparatively silent, the voices of two or 
three old gossips who sat inside the hearth in the chimney- 
corner, imbibing the grateful warmth, and seeming to breathe 
as freely and contentedly amid the volumes of smoke which 
enveloped them as if it had been pure aroma — their kueea 
gathered up to their chins, and the tails of their cotton or 
stutf gowns drawn up over their heads, suffering the glazed 
blue or green petticoat to dazzle the eyes of the admiring 
spectators — the voices, as we have said, of these old crones 
became more audible as the noisy mirth around them began 
to decrease, and at length attracted the attention of the 
other guests. 

u What is it ye're doing there ?" exclaimed the old mas- 
ter of the house, looking towards the corner with an expres- 
sion of face iu which much real curiosity and some as* 
gumed ridicule were bleuded. 



*' HOLLAND-TIDE ". 9 

" Oyeh thin nothing in the world", replied a smoke-dried, 
crow-footed, white-haired, yet sharp-eyed hag, whose three 
last teeth were employed in masticating a piece of " that vile 
roguish tobacco". '* Nothing; — only we to be talking among 
ourselves of ould times — and things — the quare doings that 
used to be there long ago — 

4 Onst on a time 
When pigs drank wine, 
And turkeys smoked tobaccy':— - 

whin themselves used to be seen by the ould and the 
young, by day and night, roving the fields and places, and 
not to be seaming about as they do now (maning 'em 
no disparagement), in a whisk of a dusty road on a windy 
day, — whin goold was as plenty as bog-dust, and there 
used to be joyants there as long as the round towers ; when 
it was the fashion for the girls to come coorting the boys, 
instead of the boys going after the girls, and things that 
way, entirely". 

u Poh, what nonsense !" exclaimed the hero of the snap- 
apple, " there's not a word ever to be had out o' the ould 
women, passing a chronicle of a fable about the fairies, and 
priests, and joyants, and things that we never seen, nor 
that nobody ever come back to tell us about — what kind 
they wor — or what truth was in 'em. Let somebody sit 
upright and tell us something that we'll know is it a lie 
that he's telling, or not". 

44 Something about wakes and weddings, and them things", 
said (a note above her breath) the modest, small mouthed 
Norry Foley. 

" Or smugglers, or coiners, or fighting at fairs, or Moll 
Doyle, or rebellion, or murthering of one sort or another", 
roared he of the legs. 

" Easy now — easy the whole o' ye !— easy again ! " said 
the host, waving his hand round the circle to enjoin si- 
lence, — there may be a way found to please ye all 1 " (this 
was said with an air of good-natured condescension, as if 



: * HOLfcAND-TIDE ". 

the speaker, in his benevolence, were about to tolerate 
rather than enjoy the silly amusement which the youngsters 
meditated). " Gather round the fire, do ye, and let every 
body tell his story alter his own way ; and let the rest 
hearken, whether they like it or not, until 'tis over, and then 
tell their own, if they think 'tis better". 

A clattering of chairs and stools, and a general bustle, 
announced the ready concurrence of the company in this 
polite arrangement. In a short time all were hushed into 
i most flattering silence, and the following tales passed 
ound the circle, lulling some to sleep, keeping others 
L\vake, each finding its particular number of indulgent, 
gratified, and attentive auditors, though no single one, per- 
iiaps, succeeded in pleasing all. 

Whether such may be the lot of the narratives among 
a more extensive and less considerate audience, remains to 
be seen. Avowing the source from which his materials 
were taken, the collector thinks himself entitled to tell the 
stories after his own liking, only requesting the critical 
reader to keep the pretensions of the book in mind when- 
ever its defects shall arouse the tiger, judgment, within 
his breast. It is not that we absolutely fear the beast, 
but we would have him reserve his royal ferocity frr a 
worthier prey, which a little forbearance in this install 
ui y induce u*, ew lou£, to lay before hiuu 



ATLMERS OF BALLY-AYLMER. 



With pleasure and amaze I stand transported! 
What do I see ? Dead and alive at once 1 

Colo. 



u The mountains ! The Kerry hills! Alone by yourself, 
and at this time o'night ! Now, hear to me, will you, sir, 
for it's a lonesome way you're taking, and them mountains 
is the place for all manner of evil doings from the living 
and from the dead. Take this little bottle of holy water, 
and shake a little of it upon your forehead when you step 
upon the heath. Walk on bold and straight before you, 
and if the dead night come upon you, which I hope no 
such thing will happen till you reach Tralee any way, yon 
won't whistle : don't, for it is that calls 'em all about one 
if they do be there ; you know who I mean, sir. If you 
chance to see or hear anything bad, you have only to hold 
these beads up over your head, and stoop under it, and, 
whatever it is, it must pass over the beads without doing 
you any harm. Moreover — " 

" Easy, easy, Mrs. Giltinaan, if you please. There is 
something of much more consequence to me than those fine 
instructions of yours. Don't mind telling me what I shall 
do in case I lose my way, until you have let me know first 
how I am to find it". 

"Qh, then, vyhy sin uhlu'i I, and welcome, Mr. Aylmer? 



12 THE ATLMERS Or BALLY -ATLMER. 

listen to me and I'll tell you, only be careful and don't slight 
themselves for all". 

The above formed part of a conversation which took 
place between the hostess of an tumble inn on the west 
border of the county of Limerick, and a young gentleman 
whose sharp accent and smart dress bespoke a recent 
acquaintance with Dublin life at least. As he was a very 
haudsorae young fellow, and likely to fall into adventures, 
perhaps I may be excused for giving some account of him, 
and in order to do this the more fully and satisfactorily, 
I shall begin by telling who his father was. 

Robert Aylmer, Esq., of Bally- Aylmer, was a private 
gentleman of real Milesian extraction, residing near the 
west coast of Ireland. Like most of the gentry around 
him at that time, he did not scruple to add to his stock of 
worldly wealth, a portion of that which by legal right 
should have gone into his Majesty's exchequer. In a word, 
he meddled in the running trade on the coast, a circum- 
stance not calculated at the period in question to attach 
any thing like opprobrium to the character of a gentleman 
and a real Milesian. Although he added considerably to 
his patrimony by this traffic, the expenses of the estab- 
lishment at Bally- Aylmer were so creditable to the hospi- 
tality of its master, that he felt himself sinking rather than 
rising in the world, and was, indeed, on the eve of ruin, 
or more properly of an ejectment, when a desperate re- 
source presented itself in the form of a smuggling enterprise, 
so daring in its nature that none lut a Milesian would 
have even dreamt of putting it in execution. He formed this 
project, as he had done many others, in conjunction with an 
old friend and neighbour, Mr. Cahill Fitzmaurice, or as he 
was called by the smugglers, from his hardiness and cruelty, 
Cahil-cruvdharug (Cahil of the red hand), a name, how- 
ever, which, like many other nicknames, was but little ap- 
propriate, for Mr. Fitzmaurice was known to mingle much 
humanity with his enterprise. Those two friends under- 



THE AYLMERS OF B KLLT • AYLMER. 13 

took the affair together, succeeded with an ease which 
they hardly anticipated, and realized a sum of money 
more than sufficient to have tempted them into danger still 
more imminent. Gratifying as was his success so far 
however, this enterprise was of fatal consequence to Mr. 
Aylmer. Having embarked with his friend on board a 
Galway hooker (a kind of vessel used for carrying fish or 
turf along the coast and up the Shannon), for the mouth 
of the river, they happened to engage in a dispute on some 
trivial occasion or other which, nevertheless, was made up 
between them with little difficulty. On the same night 
however, a very dark one, as the little vessel was putting 
about in a hard gale, a stamping of feet and struggling 
was heard on the forecastle, and immediately afterwards a 
heavy plash on the lee bow. Running forward to ascertain 
the cause, the boatmen found that Mr. Aylmer had fallen 
overboard, and Fitzmaurice was observed standing near the 
lee gunwale, and holding by the fluke of the anchor, ap- 
parently under the influence of strong agitation. He was 
seized instantly and questioned as to the occurrence, which 
he described to be perfectly accidental. A jury of his 
countrymen subsequently confirmed the allegation, and the 
innocence of the man was considered to be put beyond all 
doubt by the circumstance of his adopting the only child of 
the deceased, William Aylmer, educating him at his own 
expense, and clearing off" all the debts to a very large 
amount with which his father's patrimony had been in- 
cumbered. The youth had been educated with the infant 
daughter of his father's friend until the age of ten, when 
he was sent to the metropolis ; and he was now returning 
to the house of his benefactor, after an absence of nine 
years, during which time he had made himself perfect in all 
the accomplishments which a college, and subsequently a 
polite education, could afford. 

Having performed the greater part of his journey in a 
kind of itinerant penitentiary called a jingle, an illegitimate 



14 TEE ATLMERS OF BALLl-AYLMEfi. 

sort of vehicle, somewhat between a common cart and a 
damaged spring- carriage, possessing all the rickety in- 
security of the one, with all the clumsiness of the other, 
young Aylmer determined to trust to a pair of well qua- 
lified legs for the remainder of the route, and was now in 
the act of striking off the high road into the Kerry moun- 
tains which lay between him and Bally- Aylmer, near which 
Mr. Fitzmaurice resided, with the intention of completing 
his journey before night. 

The "Kingdom of Kerry" is, as Horace Walpole said 
of a county in England Avhich happens to be very fashion- 
able at present, a great damper of curiosity. Among the 
mountainous districts in which it abounds, are vast tracts 
of barren, heathy, and boggy soil, which are totally desti- 
tute of human inhabitants. The champaign which now pre- 
sented itself to the gaze of the traveller, was one of the 
dreariest that may be easily imagined : heath beyond heath, 
and bog after bog, as far as his sight could reach in pros- 
pect, canopied over by a low dingy and variable sky, and 
rendered still more dispiriting by the passing gusts of wind 
which occasionally shrieked over the desolate expanse with 
so wildering a cadence as almost to excuse the superstition of 
the natives, that the fairies of the mountain ride in the 
blast ; these formed the prominent characteristics of the scene 
which lay before him. 

Now and then as he advanced on his route a travelling 
tinker touched his hat to him, and a fish-jolter, from the 
western coast, nodded a courteous "Dieu ith", as he passed, 
in his complete suit of sky-blue frieze, whistling to his 
mule; while, with downcast, meditative look, the patient, 
passionless animal plodded on, stooping under the weight 
of two large cleaves of fish, intended for the next market. 
Often, too, the eye of the young collegian found matter 
more interesting in the laughing, round, red cheeks, snow- 
white teeth, and roguish blue eyes of the country girls, 
w ho hurried past him with a chop curisy, and a half modesty 



THE AYLMERS 0/ BALLY- A7L.\fER. 15 

balf cunning glauce, shot from under the eye-lash with an 
expression which seemed to say, "there be coquets out of 
Dublin". All traces of cultivation had not yet disappeared— 
the hardy potato, in all its varieties of cup, white-eye, 
English red, kidney, London lady, black bull, rattle, early 
American apple, white potato, etc., etc., etc., diversified 
the ungrateful plain with several plots or gardens of 
variegated bloom, and filled the air with sweetness. The 
young gentleman's pair of velocipedes, however, were so 
vigorous in the execution of the trust confided to them, as 
to quickly place him beyond the influence of these outskirts 
of cultivation, and, after an hour's walking, he found him- 
self far beyond the sight or sign of human habitation, a good 
hazel stick in his hand, and a Murphy's Lucian in his coat- 
pocket. He had received and noted down in his memory with 
great exactness the various landmarks by which his course 
was to be directed, and he felt too unbounded a confidence 
in his own powers of discrimination, to doubt his being 
able to recognise them when they should occur. But those 
who have been similarly circumstanced will easily acknow- 
ledge the probability of a miscalculation in this respect. It 
is even as in the great world — however minute or provident 
may be the code of instructions with which the young ad- 
venturer is furnished at his outset, he quickly finds the 
number of novel contingencies which thrust themselves 
upon him, too extensive for any second-hand experience to 
secure him against all necessity for exercising his own 
natural judgment. 

It was not, however, until he had been journeying for 
gome hours, that Aylmer began to think at all of the pos- 
Bibility of mistaking his route. His mind was occupied 
with meditations of a far more agreeable nature, — the 
expectation of speedily revisiting scenes so dear to him, 
from the recollection of the merry hours he had passed 
among them, and from their association in his mind with 
the few friends of his childhood. His benefactor he had 



16 THE AfLMERS Of BalLY-AYLMER 

seldom seen, for Mr. Fitzmaurice was a silent, solitary 
musing man, who loved little company of any kind, after 
the loss of his friend, and who was not anxious to 
conceal that a certain natural weakness of temper ren- 
dered the sight of the little orphan at no time pleasing to 
him. Miss Fitzmaurice, however, entertained a very dif- 
ferent feeling on this subject : and the childish affection 
which had swiftly developed itself on both sides, was quite 
strong enough to supply the want of natural or instinctive 
fondness. The time that had elapsed since Aylmer's sepa- 
ration from her, had not abated any of the regard which 
he always cherished towards his fair friend, and he con- 
templated their approaching meeting with a glee which 
originated a great deal in real kindness, and not a little in 
that curiosity which is so frequently mistaken for affection 
by those who feel it. He had shaped out, with his mind's 
eye, a thousand full-length portraits of the now womanly 
Kate Fitzmaurice, from the dusky evening air, and had 
completed one very much to his satisfaction, when a 
sudden salutation in a strange voice startled him from his 
reverie. He looked round him, and perceived now, for 
the first time, that the night was rapidly closing in. The 
appearance of the heavens had changed since he had last 
observed them. Clusters of broken vapour were now 
hurrying past in swift succession, and there was a bleak- 
ness in the air which seemed to portend an approaching 
change of weather. Turning to ascertain from whom, or 
whence, the voice proceeded, he beheld a man seated on 
the heath, his back supported against an in-sloping crag, 
a gray frieze coat throw u loosely about his person, a pair 
of brogues well studded with pavers (large-headed nails 
used for the strong shoes of the peasantry in Ireland), 
and an auburn-coloured felt hat, pressed down upon his 
brows. There was, nevertheless, something of finery in 
his address, which seemed inconsistent with this coarseness 
of appearance. 



THE AY*<MERS OF BALLT-AT -MER. 11 

** A question from a stranger is hardly sinful in such a 
place as this ", he proceeded, after Alymer had acknowledged 
his courtesy, " particularly as a man has his own choice 
about answering it. Do you mean to journey much far- 
ther to-night, sir ?" 

" I hope to reach Bally- Aylmer before the night has 
become much darker ". 

The stranger shifted his position, and was silent for a 
few minutes. " Bally- Aylmer !" he exolaiin.d at last ; " you 
are the young master, then?" 

" My name is Aylmer ". 

" Bally-Aylmer ! Urn. It is seven long miles from 
you now, if you took the nearest way that is, and that is 
not possible for any one to do that knows so little of the 
inoun tain-roads or tracks as you do. I was going in the 
same direction myself, but seeing the night about to fall 
dark, I preferred taking my chance for shelter under this 
crag, where I shall lie diy at least, to my chance of a 
drenching, and perhaps something worse, among the bogs 
and crags that lie about half a mile beyond us. If you 
will proceed, yon are like enough to have a hard night. 
Do you not hear the Cashen* roar ?" 

" I do , but the fear of a little rain must not deter me. 
I have been out on worse nights". 

"There are other dangers, sir, no less worthy to be 
avoided than the chances of pit and bog". 

" Oh, I remember that too — my head is filled with tales 
of the Kerry mountains, and their marauders, and bana- 
thces, and phukas ; but for the one, I am provided with 
this amulet", brandishing his beads, "and lure is a charm 
fur the other", elevating his stout black-thoru in a gay 
humour. 

* The Cashen is a stream which empties itself into the Shannon, 
at no great distance from Ballylongford, in Kerry. At ihe approach 
of rainy weather, the sound of its waters can be heara distinctly &t» 
dvUacg of many leagues. 



18 THE AYIMERS OF BALLY-ATLMEB. 

The stranger was again silent for a short time, during 
which he seemed to canvass the whole person of the yonng 
collegian with a curious eye, at the «ame time that, whether 
accidentally or otherwise, his own features were almost 
entirely concealed by his position. At length, taking from 
his pocKet a sealed letter, he handed it towards Aylmer, 
and said : " I had orders to leave this at Bally- Aylmer, 
for some one of the family there. If you will pardon the 
liberty of my offering it, you will do me a great service, 
and save me a long journey out of my way ". 

Aylmer readily took the letter, and in placing it in his 
pocket-book, caught, for the first time, a view of the stran- 
ger's countenance. It was that of an aged man, with 
nothing very uncommon in its character ; though a flash- 
ing, yet wavering and doubtful recollection, seemed to rush 
on Aylmcr's mind the instant he looked upon it. He felt 
satisfied that he had never seen the countenance before, 
and yet its expression startled him with a feeling of sud- 
den recognition, for which he afterwards could in no man- 
ner account. He had not an opportunity of pursuing his 
scrutiny farther, for at that instant the muttering of a 
distant thunder-peal, preceded by the falling of a few 
large drops of rain, induced the old man to return to his 
shelter beneath the rock. Wishing him a courteous fare- 
well, the youth proceeded on his w*y, puzzled a little at 
he knew not what. 

"If I were a Pythagorean", said he within himself, 
" this adventure might help to strengthen my faith ; for, 
unless it be a glimpse into anothor state of existence, I 
am at a loss what I shall make of it ". 

After casting a rather uncomfortable glance at the hea- 
vens, which were now darkening above him so rapidly as 
to leave him little hope of clearing the mountains so spee- 
dily as he intended, he pushed on at a vigorous rate. The 
storm which had been threatening, however, io a very 
«hort time burst forth in all its violence. The sky became 



•HE AYLMERS OF BALLY-AYLMEB. 13 

one dense mass of black, illuminated only at intervals by the 
blue and sheeted lightning, that served to reveal to him the 
perils amongst which he was entangled, without assisting to 
guide him out of them. He could perceive that the beaten 
path which he now followed, lay through a wide morass or 
hog, and so indistinctly was it marked out, that he found 
himself obliged to proceed with the utmost caution, although 
the raiu had already begun to descend in torrents upon him. 
He was mincing his steps in this manner, and beginning 
to feel a greater respect than he had hitherto done for the 
recommendation of the old man, when he was startled by 
feeling some living creature brush swiftly by his legs, so 
as almost to touch them, and presently after, in a pause 
of the storm, a loud ringing whistle, followed by a shout- 
ing and hallooing at a distance, greeted his ear. A low 
grumbling bark, very near him, seemed to give answer 
to the sounds ; and Aylmcr heard the animal which had 
been snuffing inquisitively about him just before, bound 
and scamper off in the direction from whence the voice pro- 
ceeded. In the hope of obtaining some assistance, the 
adventurer put his lungs to their best use, and endeavoured 
to outroar the warring of the elements themselves ; but 
the effort proved to be a total failure, for he was not 
heard, or at least not attended to. He hurried on, neverthe- 
less, with a feeling of greater security, on the path which the 
dog had taken, and in a short time was rewarded for his 
perseverance by feeling the firm mountain heath beneath 
his feet. He now looked round him in the hope of finding 
himself in the neighbourhood of some human habitation, 
and for once was not deceived. Not more than a hun- 
dred yards to his right, in a sudden declivity of the 
mound, he perceived a cabin, with half the wicker-door 
thrown open, and revealing, in the strong light of a 
well-furnished hearth, au abode which seemed to promise 
much comfort and accommodation. He made no mora 
ado, but straightway presented himself at the entrance. 



20 THE AYLMEKS OF BALLY -AYLKEB. 

** Boloa irath !"* he exclaimed, as he bent forward over th« 
hfllf-door, williug to conciliate the good-will of the inmates 
by alfecting a familiarity with their habits and language. 

" And you likewise ", was the answer returned by the 
" all " whom he had blessed ; a plain-looking aged woman, 
who sat enjoying the delights of ease and a dhudheen (short 
pipe) in the chimney-corner. Aylmer drew back the bolt 
of the wicker and entered. The old woman continued 
smoking her pipe without expressing either displeasure at 
his intrusion, or anxiety to do the honours of her house; 
almost without raising her eyes from the heap of red and 
blazing turf on which they were musingly bent. Finding 
whom he had to deal with, and not disposed to lose much 
time in ceremony, her unbidden guest drew a sugan-chair 
close to the fire, and while he briefly explained the cir- 
cumstances which had compelled him to be a trespasser on 
her hospitality, he made himself perfectly at home with 
respect to his shoes, stockings, and coat, which he sus- 
pended before the blaze, while he received with much 
satisfaction its full influence upon his person. After ho 
had in some degree elevated his own temperature to the 
level of the atmosphere in which he was now placed, 
another inconvenience began to press upon his recollection, 
which he yet saw no means of removing. He turned his eye 
in various directions, but could discern nothing that could 
be useful to a man in want of a supper. At length he ven- 
tured to break his mind to his hostess on the subject. 
She at once directed his attention to a cupboard at the end 
of the room, to which he repaired with highly excited 
anticipations. All his anxieties were bet at rest by the 
apparition of a good supply of cold roast mutton, with 
some oaten bread, and potatoes in great abundance. 
Laying joyous hands upon his prize, he bore it with much 
gratification to the deal table which stood in the centre of 
the apartment, and presently fell to work upon it: his 
* Bless all hcra. 



THE ATLMERS OF BALLY-AYLMER. $\ 

hostess, during the whole time, preserving her attitude 
and look of indifference or listlessness, of which her guest 
was now too agreeably occupied to take any cognizance. 

While he was yet seated at table, the sound of several 
voices outside the door diverted his attention, for the first 
time, from his fare. The occasional broken and hurried 
sentences of command or remonstrance which were bandied 
from one to the other of the unseen speakers, were alter- 
nated by the low and stifled bleatings of a sheep, which 
speedily terminated in a quick and gurgling expression of 
pain, that sufficiently demonstrated the means which had 
been adopted to secure silence. 

"Smaha buhill!" exclaimed one, "faix, she's a joyant 
of a baste. Take her round to the barn, Will ; and do 
you an Lewy make haste in to your supper. Here Vauria ! " 

"Vauria is here av you want her", shrilled out the old 
woman, who had, at the first sound of the voices, made 
an extraordinary exertion to place a skillet of potatoes 
over the fire before the speakers should enter, and had now 
resumed her pipe and indolence. 

This had scarcely passed, when a stout, able-bodied 
man, his face smeared with bog-dust, having the appear- 
ance of a grazier (and a very ill-looking one), flung him- 
self into the house. His astonishment at beholding a 
stranger quietly seated at his table, and demolishing his 
cheer, was so vividly expressed as scarcely for the moment 
to place his hospitality in a very favourable point of view. 
It was only after an uninterrupted gaze of a few seconds, 
that he suffered a half unconscious "Dieu ith" to pass his 
lips. " Dieu ith agns a Vauria ! "* was the reply of Aylmer. 

"'Tisn't driven in by the weather you were?" continued 
the cottager (meaning directly the contrary). Aylmer 
nodded an asseut, as he continued eating. "A smart 
evening, indeed ", was the next observation. " Sha 
guthinef't replied the collegian, still continuing to use his 
* God and Mary be with you. | Tea, indeed. 



22 THE ATLMERS OF BALLY- ATLMEB. 

vernacular tongue, and in every possible way endeavouring 
to mystify his real condition. 

The querist was about to address the old woman, when, 
darting a sudden glauce at his guest, he quickly asked 
hiin " if he understoou English ? " a question which 
the infrequency of the accomplishment in those districts 
rendered feasible enough. Instantly catching at the 
probable motive in which it originated, Aylmer replied at 
once in the negative. The cottager and the old woman 
soon after entered ink* conversation in their own broken 
aud mangled effort at the idiom. 

"An who tould him fare the mutton was ?" inquired 
the owner of the house, after the woman had satisfied 
him as to all previous particulars. "In troth it's asy 
seen what a thrashen he meant to give it, when he stript 
to the work that way ". Here Aylmer was near betraying 
himself by the smile which began to struggle on his lips. 

"Lewy did a purty piece o' work this evening (night) ", 
continued the host : " Cahill-cruv-dharug's herdsman will 
be missen a ha'porth o' tar in the mornen. One of the 
prettiest creatures on the long walk, and fat, ready to 
melt in our arms. Take it from me, Vauria, Cahill Fitz- 
maurice won't be a bit glad to be eased of her, to-morrow 
morning ". 

" Let him score it over against the blood of Robert 
Aylmer, then, and he'll be the gainer still, may be", 
muttered the old woman. 

"Phol Pho! Easy. What nonsense you talk. Was'nt 
he cleared o' that be a judge an jury, in the face o' the 
whole country ? — Pho ! " 

" I was aboord the boat that awful night, an I heard 
words spoken that ought'nt to pass a Christian's lips, 
except he was a Turk. But what's the use of being 
talking? There's as much time to come after as ever 
went before us, an they say blood will speak if it bursts 
the grave for it ". 



THE AYLMEM Oi'' BA-LY-AYLMER. 23 

Often as he had heard these circumstances repeated, 
and enthusiastic as early conviction had made him in the 
confidence of their utter groundlessness, it was not very 
easy for Aylmer to support his assumption of perfect list- 
lessness and indifference, while the above conversation 
was passing. Notwithstanding the feeling of indignation 
which the rambling imputations of the hag excited in 
his mind, he could not prevent their sinking deep into his 
spirits, and taking a hold there which he in vain en- 
deavoured to shake off. The conviction, too, of the 
immediate and imminent peril in winch he was placed — 
for it was no longer a matter of doubt to him that he had 
fallen upon a gang of the far-famed Kerry sheep-stealers 
— contributed not a little to the uneasiness of his situ- 
ation. He began strenuously to long for an opportunity of 
withdrawing himself from the chauce of further illustrations 
of their mountain hospitality. 

Shortly after, the cottager started up from his seat by 
the fire, and said rapidly : " There's the white horse ou 
the pzaties ; I'll go and and see what is it keeps the boys, 
and do you get up one o' your old ancient fables, and 
keep this man by the fire till we come back. We'll talk 
o' what's to be done abroad ". 

No sooner had the speaker disappeared than Aylmer 
began to meditate the most probable means of taking 
himself out of the cottage and its neighbourhood, without 
awakening suspicion. He got up from the table — walked 
towards the fire — resumed all his dress, with the exception 
of his hat, which still hung in the chimney corner, reeking 
against the heat: and after all this was done with as 
great an appearance of carelessness and indifference as ho 
could commaud, he took his seat by the fire, stirred it up 
briskly, and made an effort to engage his hostess in con- 
versation ; in which, however, to his great satisfaction, he 
totally failed. The old woman seemed to be one whom 
time had beaten down into a state of almost negative 



Xi THE A'XMERS OP BALL? ATLMER. 

existence, and whose only positive enjoyment seemed to 
consist in the ahsence of all exertion. Far from com- 
plying with the cottager's desire that she should endeavour 
to entertain her guest, she seemed, from the moment of his 
departure, to be almost unconscious of the presence ef a 
second person ; and went on exhausting her store of to- 
ba?«o, and musing over the fire with the comfortable air 
of a slave who has been relieved from the presence of the 
task-master. 

The violence of the tempest had now considerably 
abated, although the night still continued dark, and the 
wind hissed along the broken thatched roof in fitful and 
nneasy gusts. After making some observation on the 
change, Aylmer walked towards the little window, as if to 
look out upon the night, and in so doing stumbled upon a 
new confirmation of his suspicions. Casting his eye, 
accidentally, towards the hurdle loft, which was con- 
structed over the ceiling of an inner apartment, he 
observed several piles of sheepskins thrust under the 
3loping eaves, and heaped towards the centre, the spoils 
of many an enterprise similar to that of which he had just 
before witnessed the termination. 

As the time rolled on, the anxiety of the youth in- 
creased, and he determined at length on making some 
exertion for his freedom, before the male tenants of the 
cottage should return. Leaving his hat where it hung, 
in order the more effectually to baffle the suspicions 
which his absence might occasion, he made some trifling 
remark to the old woman, and passed into the air. After 
he had crept a few paces from the house, and felt himself 
placed without the immediate circle of the influence of its 
possessors, he made a joyous bound on his path, and ran 
along for a considerable distance, without a moment's 
pause, in the direction from which he had turned aside 
during the tempest. The rain had ceased and the wind 
abated, but the sky was yet loaded with vapour, and ehr 



TH£i AYLMERS OF BALLY-AYLMEB. 25 

wanderer had little more than random conjecture to de- 
pend upon in pursuing his route over the mountain heath. 
Early as it yet was in the night, and totally ignorant as 
he was of the distance he might have to conquer before 
he should arrive at the termination of the wilds, he could 
not avoid feeling an occasional depression of spirits when 
he reflected on the possibility of his being pursued ; in 
which case the familiarity of his enemies with the passes 
of the mountain and its bogs, must leave him at a 
perilous disadvantage. He dashed forward on his way, 
however, without stopping to calculate disheartening 
probabilities, and journeyed fur nearly an hour without 
meeting any impediment to arrest his progress, or any 
piece of good fortune that might assist it. 

On a sudden, the disparting of an immense mass of 
cloud, which had for a long time been condensed on the 
horizon behind him, betrayed the night-walker to the 
glances of a few kind stars, and very shortly after the veil 
was withdrawn from the fair, round, fat face of the winter 
moon herself, and a welcome flood of light was poured 
about his path. He now discovered himself to be still 
surrounded, as far as his sight could reach, with the uneven 
wilderness of heath, over which he had so long been 
toiling, and no indication lay, within the wide circuit 
which his eye was enabled to comprehend, of human 
neighbourhood. There was no sign of cultivation, no 
bound of partition, nothing but heath and bog to be dis- 
covered, and this circumstance contributed materially to 
depress the cheerfulness of spirit which the sudden acces- 
sion of light had awakened within him. This uncomfort- 
able state of mind, however, in some time began to give 
place to a feeling of more immediate and positive alarm. 
Whether it was that his imagination, highly excited as it 
had been by the events of the evening, became over quick 
at transforming all indistinct sights and sounds into 
occasions of tenor, or that such occasions did in reality 
2 



2C THE AYLMERS OF BALLY- AYLMER. 

exist, Aylmer could not divest himself of a strong con- 
sciousness that the chase was up behind. Now and then, 
in the intervals of the distant moaning of the Cashen, hia 
ear was startled by the fancied or actual echoes of the 
baying of a hound upon his track, a sound, however^ which 
was yet so fine and so equivocal, 

M that nothing lived 

'Twixt it and silence". 

He paused for a moment, and bent his ear to the earth 
in order to assure himself. In a little time he becamo 
convinced of its reality. The portrait of the cottage 
hound which had startled him at first sight by the indi- 
cations of fatal sagacity which he could collect from ita 
appearance, " so flewed, so sanded ", its head 



hung 



With ears that swept away the morning dew, 
Cross-kneed, anddewlapp'd like Thessalian bulls"; 

its sullen, blood-shot eye, and lumpish mouth, all rushed 
together upon his recollection, and utterly discomfited the 
slight feeling of security to which he had just before 
begun to deliver himself up. He grasped his black thorn 
club with a firmer gripe, and at once made up his mind 
to the most desperate contingencies that could arrive. If 
a much more extensive tract of land lay between him and 
the houses of honest men, it was evident he had not the 
slightest chance of eluding his pursuers, provided as they 
were with so fearful and so infallible a clue to his position. 
His only reliance was on a pair of vigorous limbs, which 
he forthwith applied to the best purpose possible, and 
which he might have calculated on with very great ra- 
tionality, had his hunters been altogether human. As it 
was, in spite of all his exertions, he found that they were 
gaining rapidly upon him. He darted forward with re- 
newed speed, and as he panted and stumbled on his course, 



rp= 



THE ATLMERS OF BALLY-AYLMER. 27 

in one of those glances of reflection, which even in the 
act of the most violent bodily exertion, will sometimes 
flash upon the reason, he made a wordless resolution 
within his heart, that he never would hunt or course a 
hare as long as he lived. 

Still he dashed forward headlong on his path, and still 
that horrid, sullen, twanging cry became louder and louder 
upon his track, until it sounded in his ear, as the trumpet's 
charge might be supposed to do in that of a soldier des- 
tined to a forlorn hope. The shouting of the animal's 
masters, too, cheering their guide upon the game, became 
audible in the distance. With a failing spirit, Aylmer 
glanced on all sides as he bounded along, but could discern 
no means of even possible protection. No stream, no 
tract of water by which he might baffle the terrible instinct 
of his four-footed enemy, not one of the many contri- 
vances by which he had heard and read this had been 
successfully accomplished, here presented themselves. His 
brain, his sight, his senses became confused ; a fear like 
that which oppresses the dreamer in a fit of night-mare, 
lodged itself upon his heart ; his will became powerless, 
and the motion which still hurried him along his path, 
might almost be termed involuntary. He thought of 
nothing, he saw nothing, he heard nothing, but the fast 
approaching terrors in his rear, the heavy, confident baying 
of the hound, and the fierce hallooing of his pursuers. 
Fortune seemed in every way to conspire against the de- 
voted youth, for in rushing down a slight declivity of the 
heath, a small tuft of the weed came in contact with his 
foot, and flung him with considerable violence on the 
ground. He sprung to his feet again, but fell at the first 
effort to proceed ; his foot was maimed past all use. One 
thrill of utter despair shot through his frame, and the next 
moment a perfect indifference came over him. The shouts 
of the hunters were now almost close upon him, but, and 
he hardly trusted his sense when it first informed him of 



fed THE AYLMEKS OF BALLV-AYLMER. 

it, there was another sound mingled with theirs. He 
started to his feet, and stood erect in spite of his hurt ; he 
heard tiw sound distinctly — it was the dash of waters on 
his left. Clasping his hands together, and offering, in one 
flashing thought, as fervent a thanksgiving as ever passed 
sinner's lips, he staggered toward the spot. Coming sud- 
denly over tide brow of the hill, he beheld immediately 
before him a stfiall river, broken in its course by several 
ledges of rock, and flinging itself in masses of white foam 
into a kind of (usin, whose surface the full winter's moon 
had lighted up with its gladdening influence, so as to 
shine "like a welcoming" in the student's eyes. The 
banks of the strewn were fringed with drooping sallows, 
and a dark angle close to where he stood seemed to offer 
the closest and secm«st mode of concealment that he could 
desire. Without » moment's thought or wavering, he 
slipped down the bank, and seizing one of the twigs, 
plunged himself, all seeking with perspiration as he was, 
into the cold, freezing, November flood. 

He had not been in this situation long enough to feel 
the inconvenience of the transition, when his anxieties 
were renewed by the approach of his pursuers. Creeping 
under the screen of the hanging sallows, and still clinging 
to the twig which lit had grasped, he remained up to his chin 
in the water, imitating the action of some species of water- 
fowl, when conscious that they are under the eye of the 
fowler. From this concealment, completely enveloped, 
as he was, in a piece of impenetrable shade, he could see 
his bandy-legged, shag-eared foe, bound fiercely to the 
bank immediately above him. The animal stopped short, 
snorted, looked across the stream, and whisked his head, 
with an action of impatience and disappointment. He 
ran up and down the bank, his nostrils expanded and 
bent to the earth, and snuffed long and argumentatively 
about the very spot where Avlwor had descended. In a 



THE AYLMERS OP BALLY-AYLHEB. 29 

few seconds after he heard the voices of the mountaineers 
at the top of the hill. 

" Blessed Saviour o' the airth ! — Lewy ! the sthrame ! 
— We're lost for ever! — Come back here, Sayzer! — The 
unnait'rel, informing Dane ! To come among us and make 
a fool of a shoulder of as good mutton as was ever dhrov 
the wrong way off a sheep-walk ; and, I'll be your bail for 
it, he'll have the army with us to buckist* in the morning, 
av we stay for them (which we won't) — sorrow skrecd o' 
the malt he left upon the bones, as much as would make 
a supper for old Vauria herself". 

Ayliner was too uncomfurtably situated at the moment, 
to enjoy these jests on his prowess at the sheep-stealer's 
board, and waited with much uneasiness until the speaker 
and his companions might be concluded out of all power 
of observation. Day had begun to dawn before he ven- 
tured to re-ascend the bank; and never was the benevolent 
eye of the morning startled by a more pitiable spectacle 
of solitary human misery, than he presented at that 
moment. His fingers, stiff and crimplcd up with the cold, 
refused to closo around the shrubs which he attempted to 
grasp, his joints were all stark and painful, and his hair 
and clothes distilling a hundred streams, as if he were, like a 
male Niobc, about to be resolved into a portion of the element 
to which he had just been indebted for his existence. 
Great as was the general inconvenience which he felt, how- 
ever, he had the satisfaction to find that the cold im- 
mersion had arrested the progress of whatever inflamma- 
tory symptoms his sprain in the foot had occasioned, and 
he was now enabled to turn the limb to which it apper- 
tained to some account. He walked, like apiece of half- 
animated stone-work, along the banks of the stream, for 
nearly half a mile, and had the pleasure to observe, in 
Bpitc of the clouds which the agitations and exertions v$ 



SO THE ATLMEES OF BALLY-ATLMEB. 

the night had still left upon his brain, that he was close to 
one of the most frequented public roads of the country. 
He had no difficulty in discovering his exact position, and 
was not a little comforted at finding that he was no more 
than a mile from the residence of his friend and guardian, 
Mr. Fitzmaurice. Not willing, however, to present him- 
self before his old friends in the deplorable yet ludicrous 
plight to which his mountain adventure had reduced him, 
he directed his course toward his own family residence, 
which lay at no great distance from him, and which, though 
it had only occasionally been occupied by him, was, he 
knew, tenanted by the aged widow of his dead father's 
herdsman, and her son, Sandy Culhane. At the hands of 
those old " follyers " of his family, Aylmer knew he might 
calculate on receiving all the accommodation which his 
present condition rendered necessary. His long absence 
from the country, uninterrupted, as it had been, by even a 
visit to his friends at the customary seasons for such in- 
dulgence, secured him against all probability of being 
recognized on the way to the " great house ", and he met 
with no interruption in his walk thither, which was easily 
accomplished before the sun had well shook himself aftei 
his night's sleep. 

Bally- Aylmer was one of those architectural testimonies 
to the fully of our fathers, which are scattered rather 
abundantly over the face of the green isle. Although the 
term has slipped from beneath our pen, there was little 
worthy of the name of architecture, about either the prin- 
cipal building or its official appendages. The site of the 
house appeared to have been selected in those days when 
it was the wont (contrary to modern practice on similar 
occasions) to choose the lowest, as the most graceful, as 
well as 'joiivcnient and salubrious position, and when that 
position was ascertained by rolling a large round stone 
down an eminence, and sinking the foundation wherever it 
happened to repose. Aylmer, fatigued as he was, found 



THE ATLMERS OF BALLY-AYLMER. 3\ 

a sufficient excitement in the first view of his native place, 
to divert his attention in some degree from his sufferings. 
Accustomed, as he had been during his absence, to the 
splendours of metropolitan architecture, he could not avoid 
feeling a momentary sense of humiliation, when he per- 
ceived the utter poverty and tastelessness of an establish- 
ment which in his childhood he had been used to look 
upon as the perfection of elegance, and with which even 
his distant recollection had not presumed to quarrel, until 
he now brought his classical feeling and experienced 
judgment full upon it, in all its hideous and awkward 
reality. The entrance consisted of two lean, gawky- 
looking piers, built of plain rough stone, and standing 
bolt-upright, like young steeples, on each side of a low, 
shatteied, paltry wooden gate, which had long discon- 
tinued the use of its hinges, and was propped up to its 
office by the assistance of a few large stones, rolled against 
the lower bars, the removal of which, for the admission of 
cars (carts) and horses, usually occupied as much time 
each day as a carpenter might have lost in screwing on 
a fresh pair of hinges. On the summit of one of those 
piers, a noseless Banthee, or Banathee, done in lime- 
stone, the work of some rustic Westmacott, might be 
observed in the act of combing her long and flowing hair, 
an action very generally attributed to this waruing spirit. 
Upon the other, nothing was visible to the naked eye. 
That fashionable appendage to modern improvement, a 
factitious lake, was not wanted here, though the specimen 
presented was rather on the small scale. It consisted of 
a sheet of some liquid or other, about twenty feet by 
twelve in extent (l)ing close inside the entrance), and 
greeted more senses than one of the incomer, with an in- 
tensity which it required no great fastidiousness to de- 
precate. The house itself, a square-roofed, lumpish- 
looking edifice, sadly out of repair, and dr itute of even 
a solitary twig or fir to conceal its thrcauuaro masonry, 



32 THE AYLMERS OF BALLY-AYLMEB. 

its line of red binding-tiles broken and blown away; 
its chimneys damaged and menacing; and its slated roof 
hospitably inviting, in divers-apertures, the visitations of 
the winds and rain — all, together, presented as bleak and 
comfortless a spectacle as ever greeted even a provincial 
eye. Without detaining the adventurous youth any 
longer in his uncomfortable deshabille, we shall hasten to 
relieve the pain of our sympathising reader, by informing 
him that Aylmer was not disappointed in his calculations 
on the services of old Ally Culhane, by whose assistance 
he was presently rid of his cumbersome habiliments, and 
introduced to the consolation of a well aired, well blan- 
keted state bed, where he speedily lost all memory of his 
night's ramble, in a good, sound, healthy, dreamless sleep. 
The only immediately habitable rooms in the venerable 
mansion, were that in which its heritor atpresent slumbered, 
and the kitchen in which the aged Ally and her son had 
domiciliated since the house had been in a great measure 
abandoned to them by its original possessors. The others 
had been partly stript of their furniture and locked up, or 
appropriated to the Irish use of store-rooms and granaries 
for the produce of the adjacent acres, which were turned 
to the best possible account for the benefit of his ward 
by Mr. Fitzmaurice, who seemed never happy, or even 
contented, unless when he was occupied in some way or 
other about the Aylmer property. Though he was a 
native of a country where more apologies are found for the 
shedding of human blood than would, if universally ad- 
mitted, greatly further the interests of society, and al- 
though much of his life had passed amid scenes where 
homicide was familiar as the day-light, Cahill Fitzmaurice 
had, either from a natural quickness of feeling, or from 
the influence of that half-animal, half-chivalrous sense of 
moral honour which is so often made to supply the place 
of system, of principle, or of true religion in the minds of 
a ueglectei people, retained a tetchineaa of spirit about 



THE AYLMERS OF BALLY-AYLMER. S3 

what he was pleased to call his reputation, which, would 
come with an ill grace enough from the lips of a smuggler 
of the present day. Notwithstanding his "honourable 
acquittal" too, by the county grand jury, of the horrible 
offence imputed to him, and the assurance of those his 
judges, that "he left his dungeon with as unstained a 
character as if he never had been called to it" — for 
speeches of this kind were among the specimens of cant 
in vogue then, as well as now, — Fitzmaurice felt con- 
vinced, and the conviction sunk deep into his soul, that 
suspicion was a shade of guilt, and that there was, in fact, 
no such thing as an " honourable acquittal " from a public 
accusation. The consequence of this feeling was, a total 
and marked alteratiou in the character of the man. His 
frankness — his hospitality — his broad-faced, laughing good- 
humour, — all his social qualities were blasted, as if by a 
lightning shock. He was no longer to be seen at the fair 
or session ; his steward being entrusted with an unlimited 
discretion, as to the fate of the flocks and droves which 
were transmitted to all places of public traffic. His farm 
was, in a great degree, neglected by him ; and the only 
active business in wich he still continued to take anything 
like an active interest, was, as before alluded to, the 
improvement of his young ward's inheritance, in which he 
was vigorous and successful ; having contrived, during the 
long period of the youth's minority, to amass for his 
future benefit a sum of money which might enable him, at 
the proper season, to take possession of his patrimony in 
a manner calculated to assure him of an influential station 
in his native country. His house and his board were still 
open to the traveller, and the welcome was not diminished 
either in its warmth or sincerity ; but it came no longer from 
his own lips, — he never appeared among his guests, and 
was seldom visible even to an early acquaintance. His pride, 
in fact his Irish pride, had been stabbed to the heart ; he 
felt that it was in the power of any man who grudged him 



34 THE ATLMERS OF BALLY-AYLMEB. 

the fragment of reputation he still retained, to match It 
.Tom him by a word, a look, a gesture. With this con- 
viction full upon his own mind, he had, in the two or three 
efforts which he made immediately after his liberation to 
regain his old place among his old friends, entered into 
their society with an almost morbid tremulousness of 
feeling — a quickness to anticipate the intention of slight, 
which is alike the characteristic of the fiery and chivalrous, 
and of the weak and sensitive nature, and which, in 
various degrees, has been set down as the leading pecu- 
liarity of the veritable Milesian by all painters of national 
character, from the days of Captain Macmorris down to 
those of the knight of Blunderbuss Hall. The em- 
barrassment which this feeling imparted to his manner, 
naturally communicated itself to those whom he addressed, 
and the unfortunate Fitzmaurice, not possessed of sufficient 
philosophy to trace the effect to its real origin in his own 
demeanour, attributed it at once to the unquieted suspicions 
which his overwrought susceptibility had led him to an- 
ticipate, and gave up the attempt at once in a paroxysm 
of despair. Thus it was that, with as kind, as generous, 
and as benevolent a heart as ever beat, Fitzmaurice found 
himself, in the vigour of his manhood and in the full 
possession of all those qualities which had for a long series 
of years rendered him the delight of his companions, struck 
down, by one home-blow, into a branded and degraded 
wretch, whom chance had protected from death, but not 
from ignominy. The gloom which was thus cast over his 
heart, speedily found its way to his brow ; and, in a few 
years, he would have been a skilful physiognomist who 
could have traced, in the sallow, wasted cheek, the in- 
dented temples, the contracted, darkening brows, the thin, 
colourless lips, and sullen, dark, disappointed eye of the 
man, a memory of the broad, red, careless, moon-cheeked 
face of the noisy Cahill Fitzmaurice, the Pylades of Robert 
Aylmer. No consciousness of innocence could comfort 0/ 



THE AYLMEBS OF BALLY -ATLMEE. && 

inpport him under the pressure of so grievous, so over* 
whelming an accusation as that which had been cast upon 
him. He had been charged in open court with the murder 
of his oldest and kindest friend ; he had even been bowed 
down to the ignominy of giving a formal denial to such a 
charge. There are imputations the very necessity of dis- 
proving which is as blasting to a man's character, as the re- 
cording guilty to others ; and Fitzmaurice thought, or felt, 
that this was one of them. One merit, however, he at least 
possessed amid all the blameful sullenness and darkness of 
spirit to which he delivered himself up — he never was 
heard to indulge in those "whys" and "wherefores" on 
the justice of his fate, in which (very unhappily) so many 
sufferers, self-tormentors, and uneasy speculators in matters 
of Providence, are apt to look for consolation. Fitz- 
maurice took the more rational and amiable part of quiet 
endurance ; and those who were familiar with his temper 
and habits (as he had once been), remarked, some with 
wonder, some with pleasure and commendation, that the 
doom which seemed to oppress his heart, even to breaking, 
never had the power to wring from his lips a single 
murmur of complaint against Heaven. 

Notwithstanding this sentiment of resignation, or 
whatever it might be, it is still doubtful whether the heart 
of the man could have borne up long, if it were left to its 
own solitary broodings over the events of the past, and 
the bleak, dreary nothiugness of the prospect which the 
future presented to the eye of his sorrow. One con- 
solation, however, had been spared him — one true friend 
— unchanged, unchangeable — one wound up in all his in- 
terests and feelings, as intimately as even in the help- 
lessness of unfriended degradation he could have desired 
— one whose duty as well as inclination it was to cling to 
him under any circumstances that stopped short of moral 
guilt, and who would have died, even at that point, 
before the link that bound them together had been son- 



36 THE ATLMERS OF BALLr-AYLXEB. 

dercd. It was his only child and daughter, Katharine, ©f 
whom mention lias been made before now in our story. 
True, it was not until many years had elapsed after her 
father found cause to sigh for a real friend, that Kate had 
reached an age sufficiently matured to enable her to com- 
prehend, much less to sympathise in, his distresses ; bat 
her devoted and passionate attachment to her parent 
seemed to be born with her, and the slow but sensible 
development of a vigorous reason which manifested itself 
in the progressive force and eloquence of her consolations 
in his hours of depression, came over the spirit of the 
broken man with the influence of a gradual summer sun- 
rise. There is so much of vanity mixed up witli even the 
most amiable ser.timents of our nature, that we never 
fail to direct all the energies of our affection with 
most satisfaction and assiduity, where we perceive them 
to be most successful. There is too an unconscious 
self- gratification in the exercise of any influence over the 
thoughts and feelings of a suffering fellow-being, which 
endears him to us at least quite as sensibly as his unhapp 
fortunes do ; and ill-natured as the conjecture may appear, 
perhaps we should not widely err in attributing to a 
partial operation of this unintended, undetected self- 
jeeking some portion of the dee]) devotedness of love, with 
which the merry-hearted Kate abandoned herself in the 
full glow of youth, and with the fullest capabilities for tht 
enjoyment of more congeuial society, to the silence, th» 
solitude, and the gloom of her father's dark oaken parlom 
Without once daring to gratify a mean curiosity by as, 
certaining, or striving to ascertain, the occasion of the 
heaviness that oppressed him, she applied all the powera 
of her mind and heart to lighten and relieve it. Such 
curiosity, indeed, she never was at any time assailed with, 
for, however changed her parent might appear to othera 
who remembered him in the gaiety of his manhood, he had 
always been the same in her eyes, always the discomfite 



THE AYLMERS OF BALLY- AYLMER. JJ7 

downcast, silent, and fitful, yet kind and affectionate old 
man. Her education had taken place altogether under 
her paternal roof, and Fitzmaurice had the happiness to 
find that he had not injured his daughter by neglecting the 
hints respecting a few years' boarding in Killarney convent, 
which some religious friends had scattered in his ear. 

On the evening, and about (perhaps) the very period 
when Aylmer was converting with the stranger in the 
Kerry mountains, the father and daughter were seated in 
the large, old-fashioned parlour, the window of which com- 
manded, at a vast distance, a view of the hills or yet 
more gentle elevations of the soil which run along the line 
of coast, revealing at intervals certain glimpses of the blue 
waters of Dingle Bay, which were all massed at present in 
one glow of hazy splendour by the influence of the de- 
parting sun. Now and then a white sail, glancing like a 
speck of light on the waters, appeared and flitted across 
those scanty gaps in the horizon, all moving inland, and 
relieving by their motion and the associations which they 
waked up, a good deal of the still and monotonous repose 
of the interjacent prospect. The old man, who had been 
more than usually gloomy during the evening, and who had 
not spoken during several hours, now sat, his arm-chair 
drawn towards the window and fronting the distant bay, 
on which his eyes were fixed with an expression varied 
only in its intensity, but at all times stamped with tht 
hue of a consistent and enduring melancholy. Kate, 
with the fineness of tact which long habit as well as 
native delicacy had given her, perceived that something 
had occurred during the course of the day, most of which he 
had spent at Bally- Aylmer, to agitate him, and she fer 
that it was one of those moments at which ail interference 
with, or intrusion upon, his feelings, would jar against hli 
very nature. She pursued her work therefore in silence 
venturing only in an occasional impulse of anxiety to stea 
a glance from under her curved eye-lashes at hb darkening 



38 THE ATLMERS OF BALLY-AlTMtfc 

dispirited countenance. Had Kate been gifted vith any 
portion of physiognomical penetration, she miftflt have 
read, in that apparently still and evenly dejected range of 
features, the influence of thoughts which should have ex- 
cited her love, her pity, her sorrow, and her dismay, by 
turns. She might have beheld a long train of mournfully 
joyous associations, touched from their sleep by the in- 
fluence of the sweet scene on which his eye was tixed, and 
awakening, in their turn, recollections still more remote, all 
blended and mixed up with the absorbing event in which 
all his misery had originated, and each bringing a new 
stimulant to the disease which that event, and its con 
sequence, had occasioned in his mind. 

While each thus followed up their own fancies " in 
social silence ", the attention of Katharine was diverted by 
a light tapping at the parlour-door, which, opening pre- 
sently after, admitted the tip of a polished, pretty nose, a 
blue eye, and a section of a broad, bold forehead. Th« 
blue eye was directed on the young mistress of the mansion 
and the finger of a hand, yet reeking with soap suds, and 
of a wrinkled whiteness, was forthwith protruded f 
beckon her from the apartment. Kate obeyed the actLy 
in silence. 

"What's the matter now, Norry ?" said the young lafii 

"It's from Bally-Aylmer, miss", was the reply. "Saucy 
Culhane to be to the posht-office to day, and to hav 
letters for yourself and himself". 

Without waiting to hear more, her lively mistro*3 
bounded and skipped past the girl to the kitchen, where 
stood the welcome messenger, who had, it would seem, 
refused to deliver up his precious freight, until he should 
have received his cilbricias, eithoi in smiles or commen- 
dations, from the lips of the "jijng missis hei^elf, th* 
darlen ". 

These letters were what Katharine judged them to be, 
the avast couriers of Ay liner's return, written .h'h'UI a 



THE AYLMERS OF BALLY-AYLMER. 89 

month before, and now almost overtaken by him, an event 
\e?£ usual in Irish post-offices at the present day than it 
was then, when there was no Sir Edward Lees to keep the 
machinery in working condition. More than half the 
delight which she felt, however, instantly referred itself to 
her parent, and her affectionate heart bouuded at the 
thought, that she had at last found something with which 
she might venture to break in upon the gloom that had 
taken possession of his mind during the whole afternoon. 

" I have news for you, sir ", said she as she reentered 
the apartment on tiptoe, her pretty lip pinched up to 
murder a smile that was still struggling for its life, her 
half-shut, gray, waggish eyes bent merrily on his, and her 
whole face beaming with a child-like, irrepressible delight. 

" Go, go, you little fool, mind your work ". 

" I know who will be the loser then ", retorted Kate, as 
with an affectation of hoydenish freedom, she leaned over 
the back of his chair, and flourished the letter before his eyes. 

"Who, monkey?" 

"Do you know that hand?" replied Kate, slipping one 
soft white arm round her father's neck, and with the otlie. 
holding the letter steadily before him, while she watcher 
his countenance, as one would that of a child to whom one 
has just given a new gilt-covered picture-book. WhbV 
Fitzmaurice put on his spectacles and glanced over *'..& 
contents of the letter, she felt a quick and hurrifd pul 
sation beneath her hand, which at once induce'' her t» 
withdraw it from his neck. Her intuitive delicacy of 
feeling made her shrink with scorn from the acquiring an 
insight into the soul of another by the use of any of those 
" points of cunnynge ", of which my Lord Verulam, Bacon, 
gives us so elaborate and philosophical a detail. 

"The third!" said Fitzmaurice, when he had concluded; 
"then I should not be surprised if we had him here this 
evening ". 

"This evening! my!" exclaimed Kate, as she 



40 THE AYLMEES OF BALLY-AYLMER. 

glanced first at her dress, 1 and then, involuntarily, at th« 
ancient pier-glass, with its gorgeous volumes of gilded 
foliage, on the other side of the room. 

" my! Oyou! What you? Poh! what nonsense!" 
exclaimed Fitzmaurice, as he observed the direction which 
her eyes had taken. " This young man's arrival, Kate, 
seems to give you a great deal of pleasure ". 

Kate blushed, between a feeling of consciousness and of 
surprise, and without making any reply, she looked in her 
father's face with »d expression of astonishment, confusion, 
and curiosity. 

"To me", he continued replying to her gesture, "I 
confess this intelligence brings no unmingled sensation. I 
believe I have done enough to show that I love young 
Ayhner well — I like him too, for his own gentle qualities, 
as much as for his name's sake ; but I cannot forget, 
neither, that to that very name I owe the loss of all I prized 
in life — all my old friends — my good fame, my poor wife, 
your sweet mother, Kate, who was lying on a sick-bed 

when I was dragged from her side, to and who 

mingled her death-groan with your first cry of sorrow, my 
girl, as she placed yon in my arms. But these are unfair 
and selfish modes of feeling ", he continued, as he saw a 
tear glisten in the eye of his daughter ; " I must learn to 
conquer them. Only I would be alone for the rest of the 
evening". And kissing his daughter affectionately, the old 
man passed to his sleeping apartment. 

**#*♦* 

During all this while Aylmer has been enjoying a com- 
fortable sleep, and it is high time we should wake him up 
again for the amusement of our readers, or, to speak more 
modestly, for the furtherance of our story. The noon of 
a bright frosty day had just passed when he awoke. So 
heavy and unbroken had been his rest, that he could 
scarcely believe his eyes, when he saw the sunbeams strike 
on a point of noon which he remembered from his child- 



THE AYLMEES OF BALLY-AYLMER. 11 

hood. Aylmer had not yet passed that happy season of 
life when novelty is enjoyment, and change of place and 
circumstance seems almost to imply change of being. As 
he opened his eyes on the old-fashioned curtains of his old- 
fashioned state bed, under whose lofty tester he had often 
reposed in childhood, and recognized the faces of many fa- 
miliar friends on those hangings — the same pike-nosed 
grayhound, in the yet unaccomplished act of springing 
over the same barred gate, the same hunter, sticking in the 
same slough, and the same clumsy squire, kissing the same 
funny-looking, blowzy-cheeked milk-maid — it seemed to 
him as if the whole intervening space had been but the 
circle of one long night, and all its crowd of events and 
changes nothing more than the shadows of a vivid dream. 
When he flung back the curtains, however, and tossed ly» 
manly bulk out of bed, the sight of a tolerably rounded calr 
gave him, like the beard of Kip Van Winkle, assurance of 
their reality. 

His toilet, and the preparations for it made by his old 
friend Ally, also reminded him of his change from Irish 
city to Irish country life. The luxury of soap was what 
she appeared to be totally unprovided with, from her 
having substituted in its place a handful of dry oatmeal 
and a small, clean piggin-full of new milk, a quid-pro-quo 
by no means satisfactory to a young man whose darkening 
chin advised him of the necessity of raising a lather. lie 
now perceived, what in the gray doubtful light of th* 
morning dawn had escaped his observation, the extremt^r 
dilapidated state of the apartment in which lie stood. The 
single window was eked out, half glass, half paper; and 
the shutters swung crazily on their hinges. The plastering 
of the ceiling, as well as of the walls, had fallen away 
in various places ; and, on one side of the room where 
a partition divided it from the kitchen, this circumstance 
disclosed a secret of true Munster economy, ci editable 
alike to the ancient and the present tenants of the 



42 THE AYLMEKS OF BALLY -AYLMEK. 

mansion. The partition appeared to be composed of hard 
slane-turf* which in its smooth coat of mortar and white- 
wash, had escaped the eyes of inquisitive housewives for a 
succession of lustra, until this unfortunate demolition of 
the outworks had taken place. On the first occasion for 
an immediate supply of firing, which subsequently oc- 
curred, Sandy sent his right leg through the partition, ana 
furnished his hearth from the breach, to which he often 
afterwards recurred, although a bog lay within twenty 
perches of the house, declaring that "the ould wall burned 
like coal ". The breach was at present stopped with a 
dismantled door of an inner room. "No matter !" thought 
A) liner, as he plunged his puckered-up, grinning face into 
the basin of biting cold water, "these things shall be mended 
when Itake the management of the place into my own hands". 
As he proceeded in the act of purification, he perceived 
that his own clothes had been removed from the apartment, 
as he concluded, for the purpose of being dried ; and a 
suit perfectly strange to him, both from its fashion and its 
material, was laid across the lofty back of a huge oaken 
chair in their stead. It consisted of a blue jacket and 
trowsers bagging toward the ankle in sailor fashion, both 
closely studded with gilt buttons, strung in rows wherever 
buttous were admissible, and altogether having a great 
deal more the air of venerable age, both in their cut and 
texture, than fell in very lovingly with the modern taste of 
the young student. He put them on, however, in default 
of better, and was not a little surprised to find himself as 
exactly fitted as if they had been cut for himself, and 
"upon scientific principles". As he concluded his toilet, 
be recognized, through the breach, the voice of his old 
companion, Sandy, crooning over an old fox-hunting ditty, 
as he sat in the chimney corner, addressing, between 

• So calted to distinguish it from hand turf; the one beinjf cut 
from the soil with an instrument called a wane, the other shaped 
with the hand out of a suit buggy stn tl, which is afterwards Uried. 



THE ATLMERS OF BALLY-AYLMER. 43 

occasional bars of the melody, sundry conjectural to his 
mother on the probable issue of Aylmer's return : 

" Good morrow, Fox ". — ° Good morrow, fir", 

" Pray what is that you're ating ? " 
*' A fine fat goose I stole from you : 
Pray, will you come and taste it?" 
" Niel flash e piuc 
Niel niesh e giub, 
Indeed I will not taste it ; 
But I promise you, you'll sorely rue 
That fine fat gooae you're atiugl " 

"Eh, mother! holy saints, protect an' save ns! loot 
there ! " cried Sandy, starting from his place, and crossing, 
with a face expanded in wonder and awe, to his mother, 
as Aylmer suddenly entered the kitchen, and confronted 
him. The old woman, turning her hung-bcef countenance 
over her shoulder, seemed to catch the alarm from her son, 
and flung her withered arms round his neck for pr- 
tection, while her smoky eyes continued bent on the 
astonished youth. 

"Hooee! Alilu-war-yeh ! Sandy, dear! 0, murther! 
Tis it that's there ! " 

" 'Tis himself, all out ! " roared Sandy. 

" The liven imidge! " said Ally. 

** Jest as if it stept out o' the pictur frame, down ! A 
sperrit, no less ! " 

"An the hair! an the eves! an the whole tote! It 
bates cock-fighten ! " 

" My good people ", said Aylmer, as soon as he had 
sufficiently recovered his surprise to cut short the torrent 
of their ejaculations, " this may be very amusing to you 
and very flattering to me, for aught I know ; but would 
vou be kind enough to explain what it is in my person 
that sets you roaring, and kicking, and plunging up in a 
Corner that way ? — eh ? " 

'Timl thu— thu — thu! Tis master Will, then, him- 



44 THE AYLJIERS OF BALLY-AYLUER. 

self after all !" said Ally, clacking her tongue against tb« 
roof of her mouth, as is usual among the peasant Irish, 
when they wish to express surprise, compassion, or per- 
plexity. After a little time, he was enabled to gather the 
occasion of their sudden alarm. The clothes which he 
wore, a. id which, after a great deal of rummaging among 
old chests, presses, and worm-eaten wardrobes, were dis- 
covered by Ally in an inner apartment, belonged in times 
past to his father, and helped to strengthen the natural 
likeness of the son into an almost deceptive similitude. 

" Indeed, it's a burning shame for me to mintion it 
Master Will, darling", said Ally, as she laid before hirf 
his breakfast of fresh eggs, butter, jelly, smooth-coated 
potatoes, and virgin-white miik ; " but I could'nt get a 
taste o' tay, high nor low. But av we have you here to- 
morrow, there'll be a heeler o' the bceMing** — a Irate you 
hadn't in the 'cademy, I'll be your bail. Indeed, Sandy 
and meself are trusting now a long while to the milk 
o' one stripper; as Mr. Fitzmamlce says we musn't lay t 
wet finger on the little Kerry cows that fill the firkins for 
your ixpences behind up. Troth, as I tell Sandy, I think 
it's in the cow's horns it do be g ingfrom us", etc., etc., etc. 

While this chat, and a great deal more equally edi- 
fying and imaginative, was gliding forth from between the 
old herdswoman's lips, the person addressed was very sa- 
gaciously employed on the viands which she had set before 
him, and so vigorously did he exert himself, that long 
before Ally thought of discontinuing her harangue of 
mingled welcomes, and praises, and moanings, and com- 
plaints, he cut it short by declaring his intention of 
setting oft' immediately for his guardian's house, where, as 
he rightly calculated, it was probable his baggage had 
arrived before now. 

* The first milk of a cow immediately after her accouchement ie 
called betsttngs in Ireland ; and, dressed in a peculiar way, ia con- 
sidered a delicacy there. — Tastes vary. 



TnK AYLMF-HS OF BALLY-ATLMEB. 45 

It was too cold a morning to think a great deal of lore, 
and yet. as Aylmer took his way over the crisp and frosty 
mead^-vs that lay between him and the residence of the 
Fitzmaurices, he could not avoid renewing his conjectures 
as to the probable effect of time on the frame and mind of 
his fair play-fe!lo\7, and repeatedly putting the silent 
question to his heart, whether he should now seriously fall 
in love, or no. Capitulation, on such occasions, is a very 
usual consequence of parley ; but as this happens to be one 
of those situations of the heart (so useful to a story-teller), 
in which the reader is kind enough to find novelty and en- 
tertainment even in repetition, just as one thinks the 
dinner-bell, at forty years of age, sounds quite as swceily 
as it did at ten, there can be no great harm in following 
the steps of the deliberator through all the gradations of 
his defeat. His spirit warmed within him, in spite of the 
season, as he saw the smoke curling off in the light blue 
masses (it is turf smoke we speak of, gentle London 
reader) from the chimneys of Kilavariga house (those 
classical names are destructive to all sentiment), every 
stone, and brick, and tile, and crink, and cranny of which 
were as familiar to his memory as the shape of his nose 
or the colour of his hair. There was the great avenue 
gate, on which Kate and himself, when relieved from the 
stern constraint of their guardian's eye, were wont to in- 
dulge in a fine romping bout of swinging, and riding, and 
shouting, and screaming, and laughing ; and which, if the 
truth must be told, was the scene of many a serious battle- 
royal between the pair, so far as that fray could be called 
a battle, in which all the offence lay on the feminine side. 
Stepping over the stile on one side of the closed entrance, 
a greater number of remembrancers of the olden time 
started up before him- -the haggard (Irish-English for hay- 
yard), behind the stacks of which they had played many a 
merry game of Iwop, and hide and seok ; the little pond, 
en which they had launched their green flag boats, and 



46 TIIE AYLMERS OF BALLY-ATLMEB. 

cheered them as they skimmed over the surface, with a 
keen, and, certainly, quite as philosophical an interest, as 
the speculators of the T. Y. C. matches on the banks of 
Father Thames. Leaving all these sweet stimulants of 
memory behind him, however, Aylraer approached th« 
dwelling of the still sweeter being to whom they were in- 
debted for more than half their interest. As he crossed 
the lawn, his eyes fixed on the window of the parlour, 
which (not the gentle instinct of affection, though we would 
fain assert it, but) his memory told him was her appointed 
place of work, of study, and of elegant amusement, he 
saw the light muslin blind withdrawn for an instant, and a 
fair face, with hair clustering about it, in papers, like 
ripening grapes, just showed itself, and " vanished, like a 
shooting star ". The blind was re-adjusted, and Aylmer 
beheld nothing further of the inmates of Kilavariga, until 
he had applied himself to the brazen knocker of the hall- 
door. It was opened almost instantly by (not the dear 
hand which his throbbing heart had led him to anticipate, 
but) the more robust and substantial one of Norry, the 
" getter up of small linen " to the establishment. Those 
who saw Norry on her return to the kitchen, averred that 
there were, in the heightened colour of her cheek and the 
sparkle of her eye, tokens of a welcome on her part, and 
a greeting on Aylmer's, a little more Irish than the lady of 
the house might have been pleased to witness — but this is 
none of our business. Aylmer hurried on, with a yulse 
throbbing in the tumultuousness of expectation, into the 
parlour, but he found no one there, although the disposition 
of the furniture showed him that it had been very recently 
abandoned by its mistress. The slight feeling of dis- 
appointment which this seeming coldness and tardiness 
gave occasion to was quickly removed, however, by the 
appearance of two or three curl-papers, dropped near the 
pier-glass. Aylmer smiled most roguishly acd impudently, 
as he stooped to pick one up; but he was properly 



THE AYLMEHS OF BALLt-AYLMER. 47 

punished f< >r his conceit and impertinence. It was torn from 
one of his own best composed and most poetical epistles. 

Humble J and irritated a little, he began, in the absence 
of his friend, to collect from the objects around him all 
the indications of the present state of her mind and habits 
which these could supply. The dark-grained, well-polished 
oaken floor was strewed (around the work-table) with 
fragments of dress, a species of feminine carelessness, 
which, however severely reprehended by mothers and 
governesses, has always been regarded both by Aylmer 
and myself with much tenderness, as imparting a veiy 
civilized air to a mansion, when disposed with a sufficiently 
careful negligence. Nothing is more ornamental to a 
lonely house, in a wild country, than those scattered 
symptoms of gentle womanhood. A volume of Ferrar's 
History of Limerick, lying with a thread-paper between 
the leaves, enabled Aylmer to form a diagnostic of a little 
female patriotism, while an unmuffled harp, with a music 
stand and book near the window, rather modestly thrown 
into the shade, gave indications of higher accomplishments 
than he had even been led to hope for. All these de- 
lightful conclusions were, however, soon cut short by the 
sound of a light foot upon the staircase without. His 
heart leaped into his eyes, as he bent them on the door — 
the handle stirred— it was opened. 

"Kate! Kate!" 

"Oh, William!" 

I know that there are many respectable persons, whose 
theory as well as practice it is, to make all the impulses 
of passion and feeling, as well as all the varieties of 
action and attitude, obnoxious to the rules of etiquette — • 
who can be joyous within limit, or most elegantly discon- 
solate, as the occasion may require — and to such I can 
have no apology to offer for the conduct of my heroine at 
this conjuncture. She received the friend and pi iymate of 
hex childhood with an ecatacy truly barbarous— there i# 



THE AYLMEBS OF BALLY- AYLMEB. 

no denying the fact— she almost rnshecl into Ins arms- 
she hardly checked the kiss which he was presumptuous 
enough to snatch from her, and very faintly on its repe- 
tition ; her delight was outrageously unsophisticated and 
natural — it was, in fact, an Irish meeting **■ all over". 

When the "Kates", and "Williams", and "my good- 
ness!" and "dear mees!" and bursts of laughter, and all 
the other delicious nothings in which this untamed affection 
is privileged to indulge itself on such occasions, had beeu 
nearly expended, Aylmer contemplated the face and figure 
of his young friend with greater attention, and we shall 
now describe what he saw as accurately as possible. 

He was not disappointed in any way by either the 
countenance or the person of his mistress (for as such, at 
the first glance, he had set her down) ; and, yet though the 
latter teas beautiful, the former fell decidedly short ot that 
standard. There was no exquisite combination of colour 
in the cheeks — no lilies and roses — no rubies — no di- 
amonds, and yet the face itself was perfectly captivating. 
Her lips were thin, but eternally charged with an ex- 
pression of arch gravity or undisguised pleasure, which the 
restless heart supplied in such continual succession as to- 
tally to exclude all thought of considering their pretensions 
to mere material beauty. Her eye was gray and shrewd, 
in its moments of comparative inaction, but full of fire, of 
passion, of mirth, of thought, of feeling, or of fun, ac- 
cording as those varying emotions were stirred up within 
her bosom. The whole countenance fell into a character of 
ii tensity and animation, which gave the fairest promise in 
the world of the evenness that might be expected from 
tlit mind and temper. It was the veritable window to the 
heart, for which the philosophic braggart affected to sigh, 
and was only to be love. I for the revealment of the spirit 
which was in it. "She is not handsome, decidedly", said 
the student to himself, after the elegaut fashion of his 
compeers in T. 0. D. ; " she is none of your brick-aud* 



THE AYLMERS OF BALLT-ATLMER. 4ft 

Bicrtar beauties — but I like her the better — there's vovq 
about her. 'Tis a well built forehead, too ". 

The gentleman was no better satisfied with what he 
beheld in the person of the lady, than the lady was with 
that of the gentleman. She saw in the figure of her 
grown-up friend, a well-looking, clever young fellow, 
rather under the stature of masculine beauty, and with, to 
a prophetic eye, a promise of rotundity (not corpulency) 
in his person. His face was a good oval, indicative of 
strong intellect, but perhaps quite as much, or rather more 
so, of strong passion, his forehead round and resolute, his 
eyebrows so Melpomenish, that they would have given a 
moped and anxious air to his masque, if they were not 
corrected by the vigour and bustle of the eye beneath 
them : that was an article of the greatest advantage to the 
character of the whole face. There was no affectation 
about it, and yet it was full of meaning, and had a frank- 
ness that w.as royal. His hair, rather black, and doubtful 
whether it should curl or no, was thrown back on all sides 
in a kind of floating way, an arrangement that savoured 
too much of technicality, when it is considered that he was 
a haunter of Parnassus, and had moreover once upon a 
time been an accomplice in the perpetration of the 
" Historical Tragedy " of the " Battle of Aughrim ", in a 
cock-loi't near Smock Alley, "for charitable purposes", 
on which occasion he represented the heroic St. liuth, 
who, as is pathetically narrated in the drama, 

"Ailown a winding valley met his fall, 
And died a victim to — a cannon ball! " 

Aylmcr was aDout to question his fair friend on thn 
Bubject of her father, when the door again opened, and 
the old man entered. He advanced hurriedly to welcome 
.his protdge, and scarcely looked at him, until he had 
grasped his hand, while his own, as Aylmer felt, 
trembled in the effort. He was about to sjjeak when his 
3 



50 THE AYLMEBS OF BALLY-AVLMER. 

eyes fell full on Aylmer's person ; he glanced quickly and 
rather wildly over his dress and features ; and the words 
of welcome stuck in his throat. He dropped the young 
man's hand, and shrunk hack with a look of mingled 
wildness and distrust. 

"Oh, father", exclaimed Kate, her eyes filling up, 
u won't you speak to William ? " 

" What is it Kate ? — Come near me, give me your arm, 
child". 

" Oh, Mr. Fitzmaurice, is this my welcome home ? " 

" Father, dear father ! " 

" Let the candles be lighted in my room, the sky is 
darkening. God bless us ! What ails you, Kate ? — I am 
well, I am very well. Stand back, Aylmer ! " 

" I am not welcome then ! " 

" Stand back, I say ! no yes welcome ? 

Kate, keep near me, my darling. You wrong me, young 
man, indeed you do ! " 

"How, sir?— tell me!" 

"May the great and merciful Lord of the universe 
forgive us all! Surely we are none of us without our 
weakness! William, do I deserve this of you? The night 
has fallen already : — Kate, come with me, and get candles 
in my room. Don't drag me down so, girl! I have weight 
enough upon me : this way ", and gathering the terrified 
and weeping girl closer to him, he hurried through the 
door, leaving Aylmer overwhelmed with wonder, in- 
dignation, and dismay. 

It was some time before he heard anything further of 
his host. The night had, as he remarked, fallen with 
much suddenness, and the indications of an approaching 
snow-storm began to make themselves evident in the 
thickeniDg, grayish masses of cloud that drifted close over- 
head, so as speedily to spread themselves over the face of 
the heavens. As Aylmer looked from the parlour window, 
the dreariness of the change produced a chilling elfect on 



THE AYLMEKS OF BALLY- AYLMEB. 61 

his excited spirits for the moment, and served to check the 
resolution which he had formed of instantly quitting the 
house and returning to Bally-Aylmer. He sat at the 
window, expecting the return of some of the family, and 
resolved if possible to obtain some elucidation of the 
extraordinary scene that had taken place. 

He mused in this position for a considerable time, with 
no other sights or sounds to divert his mind from the 
anxiety that was gradually deepening around it, but the 
heavy whirring of the wind as it swept over the whitening 
plain, the pattering of the snow and hail against the 
window panes, the cackling of poultry as they ran with 
expauded tails and disordered plumage right before the 
wind, to the shelter of the nearest turf-rick, the short dis- 
satisfied grunt of the hog as he stumped it sturdily beneath 
the window towards the piggery, like a four-footed 
Caliban driven in a sulk from his feast of " pignuts ", and 
in the intervals of the driving gusts, the solitary cry of a 
house-sparrow, at finding himself compelled to quit the 
exposed farm-yard before his little craw was half stored 
with its thimbleful of the scattered grain, and retire 
supperlcss to roost for the night. All those appliances, 
however, in Aylraer's pivsent state of mind produced oidy 
the effect of throwing an additional gloom over his spirits, 
and filling his heart with wavering and flashing doubts, 
conjectures, and uncertainties, with which, until the present 
moment, he had never been disturbed, and which even now- 
resisted all his exertions to turn " them to shapes ", and 
give them an assumed existence. 

After he had waited a considerable time in fruitless ex- 
pectation, his patience again became exhausted, and a 
feeling of deep and bitter indignation took possession d 
his mind. The disappointment which his young and 
ardent heart had met with in the very first burst of its 
affection, was calculated to sting more keenly on con- 
sideration, lie- had come to his home and his only frieude 



52 THE AYLMERS OF BALLY-AYLMER. 

after a nine years' absence, with a breast all glowing with 
love and ccstacy, and this was his welcome ! A cold and 
almost repulsive greeting, a few short sentences of un- 
provoked reproach, left wholly unexplained by the utterer, 
and here he remained, apparently quite forgotten by the 
family, in a dreary apartment, without a sign of pre- 
paration or of kindness. It is in such moments as this 
that the orphan is most oppressed with the full and bitter 
sense of his situation, and though Aylmer was the least 
disposed youth in the world to pule or whine, he could not 
help exclaiming to his own wounded heart, that it was not 
so parents were wont to receive their long absent 
children. 

The wormwood of this reflection had scarcely diffused 
itself over his mind, when the door opened gently, 
and Katharine entered. Her eyes were red and moist, 
and her movements still retained much of the agitation into 
which she had been betrayed by the preceding scene. Her 
look of distress was sufficient to subdue all the resentful 
emotions which had sprung up in the mind of the student, 
and the tenderness with which he took her hand and 
offered his consolations, would seem almost to imply a 
consciousness of blame, attributable to his own conduct. 
Kate, however, did not appear to view the matter in this 
light: she was the bearer of her father's apologies, and 
joined to his her own entreaties, that he would endeavour 
to forget what had passed, and remain the night at Kila- 
variga. The old man was still, she said, ill to an alarming 
degree ; in fact he had spoken so wildly on many occasions 

of late, that she sometimes feared and a shivering of 

her whole frame, and a momentary glance of horror, com- 
pleted the sentence which her lips refused to utter. 

The probability of this startling suspicion darted on 
Aylmcr's mind with all the force of truth, and he was in- 
stantly struck with a feeling of remorse at the selfishness 
of his resentment. He affected, however, to make very 



THE AYLMERS OF BALLY-ATLMER. 53 

light of the conjecture, and succeeded in restoring his 
young friend to some degree of composure before they 
separated for the evening. 

Aylmer used somewhat more care than usual in making 
his toilet the next morning, without, perhaps, being him- 
self conscious of any motive for unusual decoration. And 
by a curious coincidence enough, a similar degree of care 
and taste had been called into use in the female de- 
partment of the family, with, doubtless, a similar innocency 
of intention. Miss Fitzroaurice was patriotic even in her 
gowns, skirts, and bodies (are not our names correct, 
ladies ?) ; and she did not depart from her national prin- 
ciple even on this occasion. Her dress consisted of a 
grave-coloured Dublin tabiuct, bound tight around the 
waist (it was the fashion then and there) with a broad 
riband, a plain muslin collar (is this right too ?), as white 
as this fair paper which we are blotting with her des- 
cription, lying close and flat upon the gorge at either side : 
and that was all the finery about her, 

When the young collegian descended, he found Fitz- 
maurice and his daughter already occupying their places 
by a blazing turf fire in the breakfast parlour; the one 
domestically occupied in cutting up a large brick of home- 
made pan-bread into slices for toast, the other plunged 
deep into the columns of the last Dublin Evening Post. 
Both received him cheerfully, and no allusion whatsoever 
was made to the occurrence of the preceding evening. 
Whatever lingering of mental weakness the old man might 
yet labour under, it was soon banished by the frank and 
buoyant spirits of the young student, who appeared to 
have, and, in fact, at the time had, banished from his mind 
all thought or recollection of his ungentle reception. 

During the progress of their morning meal Aylmer de- 
tailed circumstantially his adventure among the sheep- 
slealcrs the second evening before, and Fitzinaurice called 
to mind, what he had already heard with indifference, a 



04 THE ATLMERS OF BArXY-AYLMER. 

complaint of his herdsman, made on the previous morning, 
respecting the loss of a fat wether, from the long walk. 
The consequence of the communication was a resolution, 
on the part of the young man, to lodge informations at 
once before Mr. Geoffrey Hasset, an estated gentleman 
and a magistrate, who resided within a few miles of Bally- 
Aylmer. The old man acquiesced in the proposal as soon 
as it was made, not that he entertained any longing for 
justice on his own despoilers, but feeling a satisfaction at 
the idea that he might thus be rid of the eternal charges 
of apathy and indolence which were very freely dealt 
forth by his aged steward, without the necessity of any 
acthe personal exertion. Miss Fitzmaurice, too, en- 
couraged the enterprise, as she would have done any 
other which was likely to occasion some little variety and 
bustle of circumstance in the monotonous thrum-thrum of 
Kilavariga Kve. 

Forth accordingly fared our hero ; and a few hours' 
riding brought him within view of the little village, at a 
gentlemanlike distance from which the clumsy bulk of 
Hasset- Ville stood, like a cock -throw, on the summit of a 
round, squat hillock near the sea-side, with a few lean- 
looking elms and alder trees at the rear, which served 
only to make " barrenness visible ". 

An unusual commotion had been occasioned in the 
village by the unexpected return of the lord of the soii, the 
above named Mr. Hasset, who had just given his tenantry 
the first specimen of the benefits of absenteeism since the 
Union. The loyalty of the parish was fully manifested by 
the efforts made on the part of its inhabitants to receive 
their monarch with suitable enthusiasm. As his carriage 
turned the angle of a rock, some miles distant from his 
seat, the sound of all manner of villainous instruments 
rattling away to an inspiring national phlanxty, an- 
nounced the approach of the villagers, and in a few 
minutes he was encountered by their advanced guard, * 



THE AYLMEItS OF BALLY- AYXMEB. 56 

mounted deputation, headed by a lame carpenter, who 
filled his seat on the bony ridge of a wall-eyed, unfed 
gelding's back, with the dignity of an orderly on a field- 
day, and with the resignation of a martyr. The music 
being hushed for the moment into a delicious silence, and 
the open carriage drawn up, the schoolmaster of the village 
inflicted a harangue on the occupant, which was borne 
with gracious patience, and suitably acknowledged ; after 
which, with tremendous yells, the crowd bounded on tlie 
carriage, emancipated the four-footed cattle, cashiered the 
postillions, and fastening two ropes on either side, hurried 
the lumbering vehicle along the rough and stony road 
with a velocity which caused an expression of real alarm 
to take place of the smiling condescension which had before 
diffused itself over the gracious countenance of the pro< 
prietor. As they whirled him along, amid terrific shouts 
and bursts of wild laughter, toward the demesne gate, 
the walls and the way-side were lined with gaping and 
noisy crowds, principally composed of the younger urchins, 
whose scantiness of stature obliged them to make shift in 
this manner. One of these had clambered up a gate-pier, 
and sitting cross-legged on the back of a stone monkey, 
secured his seat by passing his arm round the neck of the 
dilapidated pug, while with the other he twirled his little 
hareskin cap above his head, and added his share of noisy 
triumph to the general voice. 

Preparations having been made for the day's amuse- 
ments some time previously, there was no pause, no lack 
of enjoyment after the first burst of welcome had been 
exhausted. The demesne was opened freely to all who 
chose to mingle in the glee of the time. Tables wert- 
spread before the wooden rustic seats which were scat- 
tered through the grounds, and in the interval of the 
festive preparation, those who chose to witness or partake 
in the sports were summoned to a smooth plot beforo the 
drawing-room window, which was fixed on as the scene of 



56 THE AYLMERS OF BALLY-AYLMER. 

contention for those who chose to pat in their claims far 
the several prizes, which the liberality of the proprietor 
supplied for the occasion. The great personage was, him- 
self, at the moment, enjoying the scene from the open 
casern -nt. 

Aylmer had formed one of this last mentioned group for 
a considerable time, and joined heartily in the bursts oi 
laughter which broke from the delighted rustics, at the 
various spectacles of fun which were presented to them ; 
the racing of old women on their grvgs for a cotton 
hankitcher, the grinning through a horse-collar, and 
many other sports which it would require the pen of the 
author of the yEncid to celebrate with poetical justice. 
Suddenly a voice close at his elbow startled him ; he turned 
quickly round, and gazed on the speaker, who, unconscious 
that he was observed, repeated an exclamation of delight 
and applause, while the tones of the voice thrilled through 
the nerves of the student with a momentary influence of 
terror: a glance at the countenance was sufficient to 
satisfy him, — he laid his hand softly over the fellow's 
shoulder, and fixing a strong gripe on the breast of his 
blue frieze coat, dragged him back from the ring. 

The scene was instantly changed. The man struggled 
to free himself from Aylmer's hold, but the latter clenched 
his hand the faster ; and there was a consciousness about 
the stranger's efforts which enfeebled his strength, and beat 
him down almost to a level in point of bodily power with 
his captor. Astonished at the sudden confusion, Mr. 
Hasset disappeared from the open window, and presently 
hurried forth upon the lawn, followed by the seneschal of 
the parish, and a posse of domestics. 

" Murder ! murder ! is there nobody for the O'Deas ? " 
exclaimed the prisoner. 

" Man alive ! let go your honlt ! " shouted a young 
countryman, shaking a smoke-dried blackthorn at Ayhnejr'a 
head. 



THE AYLMEKS OF BALLY-AYLMER. 47 

"Will no one help me to secure a thief and robber? 
Ha!— Mr. Hasset!" 

" Lewy— Oh ! Lewy — darling, must it be this way with 
nsr 

" Let go your hokl ! " 

"Help! help! for justice " 

Before another instant Ayhner lay senseless on the 
earth ; and in the same space a well directed blow from 
behind had done the same rough office for Lewy. 

" Shasthone! Sandy Culhane, stick by the master!" 

" Aisy, av you plaze ! " cried Sandy, after he had fixed 
a similar gripe on the sheep-siealer's throat to that which 
his young master had been so unceremoniously compelled 
to relinquish : " Wasn't it in high time I come ? — Mr. 
Ilasset, here's your prisoner ". 

"What has he done?" 

"Ton my life that's more than I can tell— only it's 
something, no doubt, and the master to seize him : stand a 
oue side, some o' ye, and let us rise him a little - there — 
pooh ! it's nothen. What is it the villian's done to you, 
Master Will, darling? Mr. Ilasset wants to know " 

"Better ask questions within — keep both these men in 
custody — and remove the young gentleman into the house; 
he does not appear conscious yet ". 

" He isn't himself rightly, sure enough ; for the eye do 
be shutting and opening upon me as if it was blind — mark. 
Indeed I'm but a poor hand at a kippen in a fight, and to 
say that born rogue is able to walk already ", as he ob- 
served the youngev prisoner led off without much assis- 
tance, together with Ins companion, toward the house. 

The orders of the magistrate were put in execution, and 
Ayhner, still half stupefied from the effects of his hurt, 
though not seriously injured, was assisted to the house by 
two of the domestics. 

It was long before Aylmer had sufficiently recovered 
himself to identify the mountain marauder, and to explain 
3* 






68 THE AYLMEttS OF BALLY-AYLMER. 

to the wondering administrator of potty justice the cause 
and manner of the extraordinary scene which had passed 
before him. 

"And it was by Mr. Fitzmaurice's good will that yon 
came to lodge informations this way again' me, was it ? " 
said the sheep-stealer, when Aylmer had concluded. 

" He certainly will not be sorry to hear that a thief has 
been brought to justice". 

" Justice, inagh ? it's justice Cahill is looking after, 
is it? Why, then, the Vergin speed him, — and tell him 
from me that he'll come by more of it than he's bargaining 
for, may be ". 

** What do you mean, ruffian ? " 

" Is it asking me what I mane yon are ? Aisy. Tell 
Cahill-cruv-darug, that Lewy Histin, Vauria Histin's first 
cousin, that is rearing her this way, said it '11 be a sore day 
for him the day that Lewy enters Tralee gaol, barring he 
doesn't enter it at all, on his informations ". 

"You may be very well satisfied that insolence like 
this will do you no good with my friend". 

" May be not, then. Only you asked me fot I meant, 
you see, and I told you plain out. Tell Cahill I said, fot 
hurt was it to draw the blood of a little wether, in com- 
parishun of an old friend's ? — And see if Cahill will ask 
you what I mane, do ". 

As Aylmer was turning away with an expression of 
disgust, the prisoner seemed suddenly to call something to 
mind, and plunging his rough hand into the pocket of his 
frieze, drew from it a dingy piece of paper, folded and 
wafered like a letter, which, after sundry efforts to rub it 
white again with the sleeve of his coat, a process which 
by no means improved its appearance, he handed to the 
gentleman. Notwithstanding its piteous condition, Aylmer 
was able to recognize the letter which he had received 
from the unknown stranger in the mountains, and the re- 



THE ATLMERS OF BALLT-AYLMER. 59 

cognition became immediately manifest on his countenance. 
It did uot escape the observation of the prisoner. 

" Aye — it's the very same, indeed. Yon left it in the 
old Caroline as it was drying before the fire, and you see 
how honest and safe I hep it, although 'tis unknown 
to me whether there baint a halter for meself within in it ". 

The magistrate, who had been, during the above con- 
versation, buried alive in a digest, now broke in upon it, 
to declare his conviction of the sufficiency of the evidence to 
warrant a committal. This was made out accordingly, and 
Aylmer, declining a handsome invitation to stay the evening, 
returned the often neglected letter to his pocket, without 
even looking at its superscription, and prepared to depart. 

" You'll not forget to take my words to Mr. Fitzmaurice, 
sir ? " said the sheep-stealer. 

" I shall tell him what you have said, as you seem to 
desire it, although I think it would be better for yourself 
that I should be silent on the subject ". 

" Not at all, indeed ! — 0, no. Do you mark my words 
for it, Cahill will say ' yes ' to my bidding ; and a wise 
man he'll be when he says that. If he won't say it, come 
to me again, and I'll tell you a story that it concerns your 
father's child to hear". 

The few sentences which had been dropt in the 
mountain-hut by the prisoner and his female companion, 
now recurred to Aylmer's mind; and as he proceeded 
along, on his way homeward (accompanied by Sandy 
Culhane), the uncertain and uneasy feeling of mingled 
anger, fear, and curiosity, excited as it had since been by 
the scene of the evening before, pressed itself upon hira 
with an almost irresistible force. Fully convinced as he 
was that the threats and insinuations of the man origi- 
nated in mere malice, he could not yet restrain the ardent, 
and, to himself, unaccountable longing which he felt to 
search the matter to the very heart, and pluck the plain 
truth from its hiding-place. Although he had not yet 



60 TEE AYLMERS OF BALLY-AYLMEB. 

thought long enough upon the subject to encourage even 
a shadow of momentary suspicion, the misty and uncertain 
doubts which he had flung from him with indignation on 
their first occurrence, now crowded back upon his mind, 
and tortured his imagination with vague and cloudy ap- 
prehensions of some approaching horror, while his excited 
fancy wasted itself in idle efforts to discover what that 
horror could be. 

As he approached the house, the appearance of a muff 
and bonnet at a little distance directed his meditations 
into another channel. He dismounted, gave his horse to 
Sandy, who looked a volume of wit and prophecy, as he 
saw his young master vault over the stile, and run along 
the walk towards hi3 mistress. He leaned with his arm 
across the saddle for a few moments, and continued with 
mouth expanded, and smiling, gazing in the direction of 
the youthful couple, whom he had already paired together 
by anticipation in " the incommunicable tie". Aylmer ran 
for some time before he overtook Miss Fitzmaurice ; she 
had the coquetry to quicken her pace as he approached, 
and at last feigned a fair flight, which gave opportunity to 
a world of laughing, romping, and adjusting of pelerine 
and tresses, when she was overtaken. Then there was a 
pretty battle about accepting his arm ; she drew her little 
white liand from the muff, and with a sweet shrinking of 
the frame, as she felt the cold air, plunged it again into its 
warm nestling-place, from which, however, she was finally 
induced to withdraw it, and submit to her fate with the 
air of a martyr. None of these manoeuvres, delicate and 
fine-drawn as the sentiment was in which they originated, 
were lost on Sandy. 

" Isn't it 'cute she is, then, for all ? " he muttered in 
6oliloquy, as the lovers, arm in arm, glided off and dis- 
appeared in a turning of the walk. " E'then, do, look 
away", he continued, addressing the horse, whose eyes 
happened to be turned in the same direction, and pat« 



THI ATLMERS OF BALLY-AYLMER. 61 

ting the animal on the face, " indeed it's no use for yon to 
be throwing the eye after them. 'Tis to Bally-Aylmer 
*he'll be going before long, mistress of yourself, and 
tneself, and all belongen to us, my hand and word to you, 
ma copuleen beg ". And flinging himself lazily over the 
back of the animal, he turned off in the direction of the 
avenue, quickening his pace a little as the lengthening 
shadows, cast by the hedge-rows across the plain, gave 
intimation of the approaching nightfall, for Sandy had no 
wish to be overtaken by darkness on his way, in a country 
so haunted as his was with smugglers, peep-o'-day boys, 
fairies, ghosts, headless equipages, and revenue oflicers. 
This excessive precaution may not appear to coincide with 
the account given of Sandy's prowess in the forenoon ; but 
the fact was, that as there are many men who endeavour 
to conceal a conscious timidity beneath the affectation of 
nonchalance and braggadocio, so Sandy, on the contrary, 
was gifted with a much hardier temperament than he 
himself believed, or was willing to allow. His general 
anxiety to avoid danger was not merely assumed, but it 
was never suffered to be evident except in circumstances 
where no real peril existed. He was naturally nervous, 
and fond of quiet; but when once convinced that promp- 
titude and exertion were absolutely necessary to his 
personal safety, or to that of any other individual in whom 
he was interested, he seemed by a sudden impulse to start 
into a totally different being, and many instances were 
recorded of his heroic prowess, while under the influence 
of these chronic affections of valour, which would not 
have been unworthy the most daring spirit in the neigh- 
bourhood. Sandy, however, was by no means vain-glorious, 
and dreading above all things a reputation for valour, on 
account of the many troubles lie feared it might induce, he 
invariably disclaimed in his cooler moments all merit fur 
that which he had performed, as he believed under the 
impulse of some supernatural agency. 



62 THE ATLMERS OF BALLY-AYLMEB. 

As he turned into the avenue, he was suddenly accosted 
by a man who, from his position in a corner of the way, 
appeared to have been awaiting him for some time — he 
Btept quickly out upon the road, and laid his hand on the 
horse's bridle. 

" Culhane, stop I I have some questions to ask ". 

" Blessed saints ! but you startled the heart within me, 
sir ! Isn't it a droll way, that, for you to make out upon 
a body, as if it was itself that was there ". 

" No nonsense now, Sandy, we have too much business 
on our hands. Have you seen old Evans ? " 

" I did your honour's bidding. But he says, the only 
way for him, says he, is to deliver himself, round and 
sound, before the judge at the next assizes, and tell the 
whole story out o' the face. It's the greatest nonsins in 
life for him to be afeerd, for though the warrant is still 
out against him, all the evidence is scattered aud lost, and 
moreover the affair is forgotten a long time now : so that 
he had best make one bould stroke for his own again ". 

The stranger seemed lost in meditation for some time, 
then suddenly accosted Sandy : 

" And the affair here at Killavariga, how does it go on, 
Sandy?" 

" Why thin, smooth enough. I seen himself and her- 
self funnen together a while ago, like two that would be 
coorten, and not far from the end of it, neither. Av they 
don't have a hauling home before next Sherrove, call me 
an honest man ". 

" Never, by this book ! "* exclaimed the stranger, with 
vehemence, slapping his hand upon the pommel of the 
saddle : u I'll prevent that, at all events ". 

"And what do you say to Mr. Evans's advice?" 

" We'll talk of that another time. You will take care 

* It does not necessarily follow, when an Irishman swears "by 
this book ", that the object which he indicates shall be a boob, or 
have any relation to it. The oath is a very usual one. 



THE AYLMEKS OF BALLY-AYLMEB. 68 

to be in the way to-morrow, and let our friend Ally have 
a bed for me to-night, and keep the tire awake until I 
return, whatever hour that may be ". 

" But I have something more to tell you", Sandy called 
out, in an under-toue, as he saw the stranger prepare ro 
depart. 

" Reserve it for this evening, or to-morrow ". 

"'Tis regarden the Histins". 

" Hang them all up, high 1 I want to hear little more 
of them now". 

The reiterated " But, sir", of Sandy, was lost upon the 
retreating colloquist, who, as it then appeared, had taken 
his departure in good time to escape observation, if, as his 
manner indicated, he were in reality anxious to avoid it. 
As Sandy turned his horse's head to proceed towards the 
house, he encountered the plump, little, rosy-cheeked 
maiden whom we have before mentioned as one of the 
household of the Fitzmaurices. An Irishman, of what- 
ever rank or grade he may be, thinks it always a serious 
part of his duty, whenever he meets a woman alone, to 
begin with a compliment, be it good or bad. 

" It's coimncn out rubben snow-balls to your cheeks you 
do be, this way, that makes em so rosy, I'll be bound ", 
with a smile which he intended should be an arch one. 

" Never mind Norry's cheeks, whether they do be roty 
or no ", replied the fair one, with a smile that dimpled 
them into the similitude of buds half-blown, and which, 
at the same time, confessed that the flattery had not been 
thrown away (when has it ever been ?) — " only come, as 
fast as hops, to the master, and don't uusaddle the horse, 
for he's going to send you of a message ". 

" A'then, what's the murder now, Norry, eroo ?" 

" All on the 'count of young Master Aylmer, thin. He 
to come in and to giv« tidings to the master about how he 
took the Histins, tne Micep-stalers, and to make out a nar- 
raytiou o' what Lewy Histin, the bom rogue, said concar- 



64 THE AYLMERS OF BALLY-AYLMER. 

ni'ng the master — and the master to be taken ill, just as 
he was, there isn't only a day there sence, when he seen 
Mr. Aylrner in the sailor's clothes. The master is like an 
innocent, mad intirely above in his bed-room, and the 
young missiz with him, fare he's callen for you, all so fast, 
there's half an hour there sence." 

" It's a droll bizness, Norry, isn't it ?" said Sandy, as 
he dismounted, and placing the bridle rein on the hasp 
of the kitchen door followed his fair conductress into the 
"7 house. 

In the meantime Aylmer was left in the parlour, to 
ruminate on this repetition of the wonders of the previous 
evening. He could scarcely persuade himself that all 
this could be fortuitous, and the deep and festering suspi- 
cion had already begun to lodge itself upon his heart, 
and to darken on his brow, and in his eye, when it w;us 
again met, and disabled by a piece of frankness on the 
part of his guardian. He had, after the first access of 
agitation had gone by, freely admitted the occasion in 
which it originated. Those very Histins were the only 
persons present, when the fatal dispute took place be- 
tween him and Robert Aylmer, and his young friend 
surely could not be surprised, that so powerful a remem- 
brancer of that dreadful night, that night which had been 
to him the cause of so much grief, shame, and suffering 
(not the least of which might be accounted the loss of an 
old and dearly loved associate,) should exercise a more 
than ordinary influence upon his spirits. Aylmer could 
not but be affected by the justice of this representation, 
as well as by the agony of mind in which it was delivered 
by the sufferer ; and he had separated from him and his 
daughter, after a thousand assurances of perfect confidence 
and affection, and various efforts at condolence, which, how- 
ever, the old man seemed to receive, as was most natural, 
with sufficient impatience. 

Still, however, there was a restlessness and a working 



THE AYLMERS OF BALLY-AYLMER. 65 

at his Heart, a craving and hungry curiosity, which told 
him there was much yet to be learned, and resisted all the 
efforts to persuade himself that he was satisfied. While 
he leaned on a table near the window, which looked into 
the yard, he heard the clattering of a horse's feet over the 
pavement, and presently after the voice of Sandy, addres- 
sing some words of grumbling indignation to some person 
near him, and alternating his complaints, as was his 
manner when under any excitation, with snatches of an 
old piece of chimney-corner croonery. 

" A fine time o' night it is, indeed, to be senden one a 
lonesome road off to Hasset Ville, all a' one the day isn't 
long enough. Stand aizy, you ugly baste (to the horse). 
And the O'Dcas, the Histins's faction, vowen vengeance 
again me early and late, for given Lewy to the law". 

"To Hasset Ville!" said Aylmer, starting from his seat, 
and looking out into the yard, where Sandy stood tighten- 
ing the girths of his horse, and grumbling and singing 
alternately. 

" ' There was an old 'oman toss'd up in a blanket 
Seventy times as high as the moon : 
Fare ^e was ' 

*' Aye, and the rivinue min out, too, not knowen h it 
for a smuggler they'll take me. 

4 Fare she was goen I couldn't emagine 
But in her hand * 

"To shoot me, may be, unkuownst, murder! 

' But in her hand she carried a broom*. 

,c Isn't it what they done to Tim Dalton, near the cross 
in the hog, and I have to pass that cross, too, and in the 
dark, fare they say Tim do be goen about with his head 
under his arm doen penance, in regard of cutting corn of a 
retrenched holliday ; murder I 



66 THE AYLMEfiS OF BALLY-AYLMER. 

" • Uuld 'oman, ould 'oman, ould 'oman, siz 1, 
Erra, fare are you goen up so high 1 
To sweep the cobwebs off o' the sky, 
And av ' " 

He was cut short in the melody by Aylmer, who threw 
op the window, and beckoned him close underneath. 

" Who is sending you to Hasset Ville, Sandy ?" 

"Himself, thin." 

" With what message ?" 

" With a letter, see, in regard o' the Histins ; and I 
abn't to show my face, av I don't deliver it to-night — a 
poor case." 

The recollection of the prisoner's words instantly flashed 
on Aylmer. There was a message for their liberation 1 
There was a ground for the man's threat ! Aylmer paused 
a moment, like one who has received a stunning blow, 
then, addressing Sandy : 

" Would you wish to have a brace of pistol bullets in 
your brain before morning ?" 

" O fie ! murder ! Master William darlen, fot do you 
mane ?" 

" That you must not, as you value your life, go to Has- 
set Ville to-night. Take the horse off to Bally- Aylmer, 
and have him ready for me to-morrow morning. In the 
mean time, keep the letter safe until you are called upon 
to deliver it up." 

"And what'll I say to Mr. Fitzmaurice, sir, when he'll 
ax me concarnin his orders to-morrow ?" 

" Keep out of his sight altogether, and I will take all 
the blame upon my own shoulders ?" 

" Murder ! murder ! but it's a droll story," muttered 
Bandy, secretly rejoiced in his heart at the countermand. 

" I'll do your honour's bidden, any way, without any 
questions. Allilu, murder alive !" and off" he rode in very 
good humour, leaving his young master in a state of mind 
by no means similar. 



THE ATLMERS OF BALLY -AYLMEB. 67 

On inquiring from a servant, Aylmer learned that the 
old man still continued ill, and that he had even requested 
his daughter to retire to her apartment, and leave him 
alone for the night. The young student's wish, in the 
first heat of his agitation at the discovery he had made, 
was to instantly fathom the motives of the old man by a 
personal interview, but a moment's consideration suggested 
to him the propriety and advantage of a little caution. 
He resolved to use every exertion in his power to obtain 
something like a corroboration, if not confirmation of his 
doubts. He took the light from the hands of the servant, 
and proceeded with a loaded and anxious heart toward 
his sleeping room. 

Before we proceed to detail the occurrences of the night, 
it may be necessary to say something in the way of an 
apology to the enlightened reader, for what must at fir3t 
sight appear to be a childish and threadbare essay on bis 
credulity, more particularly as some little efforts have been 
hitherto made to give the narrative a hue of verisimili- 
tude. We beg to disclaim any unworthy purpose, and 
only, like faithful chroniclers, record every event, be it 
wonderful or otherwise, even when we are ourselves un- 
able to find a cause for it " in our philosophy". It will 
be much the better way, if the reader will sutler his judg- 
ment to travel quietly along with the narrative, suspending 
it where it is offended by improbability, and awaiting the 
occurrence of fresh incidents to atone for and explain the 
past. 

The side of the bed in which Aylmer slept, was placed 
towards a large window, at about two yards distance, and 
the room itself was large and half wrapt in gloom, on which 
the light which he held in his hand had but a very partial 
influence. Perceiving that the moonlight fell with an 
unusual brightness (the natural consequence of the snow 
showers which had covered the ground and the roofs of 
the houses within the last few days) upon his bed and im- 



68 THE AYUIERS OF BALLY-AYLMER. 

mediately around it, Aylraer threw down the heavy dark 
curtains on that side, and after having endeavoured to 
compose his mind to prayer, proceeded to undress. In the 
progress of this ceremony, he happened to put his hand 
into the pocket in which he had deposited the mountain 
stranger's letter. He resolved, at length, now that he 
was perfectly at leisure, to examine it. The superscrip- 
tion, though half erased by the rain and ill usage, was 
still sufficiently legible to satisfy him that it was directed 
to himself, and with a passing emotion of surprise at the 
stupidity of the man, who took so little trouble to make 
himself certain into whose hands he was committing the 
paper, he broke the wafer, and read the following words : 

" Mr. Robert nylraar. sir, there Is A Scanie goen on 
bee Tune Cahil-cruv-d rug an His daatur For you to 
marry Her, and make Her missis nv bally ayl Mur. Wil- 
liam deer dont Take the hand Thats redd wit your fathers 
Blood. If you Wont bee sed be me yool hecr moar iu 
Time frum 

an Ould folly er o The famalec". 

With something less of persevering industry than might 
have enabled him to make tolerable progress in the far- 
famed Babylonian slab, Aylmer contrived to extract the 
above from the strange mass of hieroglyphics which the 
letter presented to him. Had he opened the paper but 
one day sooner, he would have Hung it from him with 
tecntenipt, and thought no more of its contents ; but the 
occurrences of the last twenty-four hours had leit his mind 
iu such a state of excitation, that he would have caught 
with eagerness at a much more slender clue to an expla- 
nation. The suspicion was not, at all events, peculiar to 
his own breast, and it seemed to be more than a suspicion 
with some. He determined, as he had at length obtai.uei) 
a guide, that he would thrid this labyrinth to its centre. 



THE ATLMERS OF BALLY- A YLMEB. 69 

and after muttering this resolve between his teeth, he ex- 
tinguished the light, and threw himself on the bed. 

Still it was long before he could sleep. After exhaus- 
ting all the customary modes of inducing slumber, without 
producing the desired effect, trying in vain the right side, 
and the left side, and the right again — pummelling the in- 
nocent pillow, and railing in heart at the equally innocent 
chambermaid, he fairly abandoned himself to his waking 
meditations, and gave up the attempt to conquer his rest- 
lessness altogether. This show of non-resistance, however, 
he soon found was the very surest mode of achieving 
triumph in such a case. Sleep, like good fortune, is not 
always to be taken by a coup de main — she will mora 
frequently shed her blessings on the brain that is neglect- 
ful of her, than on that which is busy in devising means to 
accomplish her favour. He lay gazing on tho curtain, 
which the moonlight rendered almost transparent, suffering 
thought after thought to glide quietly through his brain, 
each waxing fainter than the other, until at length the 
power of discrimination became inert, and consciousness 
itself began to fade away into that soft and gentle deli- 
rium which precedes the access of perfect mental repose, 
and forms one of the most luxurious and exquisite enjoy- 
ments which the weary spirit can receive from absence of 
active exertion. His eyelids were just drooping, and the 
Tisual faculty itself was just dormant, when he was 
suddenly startled by observing the shadow of a human 
figure thrown upon the bed-curtain that hung between 
him and the window. It flitted across, and was lost, 
almost before he had sufficiently roused himself to be 
certain that it was not a creation of his fancy. After 
drawing the curtains aside, and demanding: "Who was 
there ?" without receiving any reply, he dropped them 
again, and in the moment of their fall, as they rattled on 
their hrass rings, his ear caught, or fancied it caught, a 
Bound like the turning of a door-handle. He listened 



70 THE ATLMERS OF BALLY-AYLMEB. 

Again, but " heard nothing only the silence n . Satisfied 
that his auricular as well as his optical senses had been 
playing the antic with him, he flung himself back on the 
bed, and was speedily lost in the world of dreams. 

In a short time his visions assumed a turbulent and 
anxious, though rather whimsical air. They were crowded 
with all the horrors of the three last days. He dreamt 
first that the letter before mentioned was written in Greek, 

and that Doctor , one of his college superiors, was 

rating him for not being able to read it off at sight ; that 
it suddenly changed into Gajlic, and the Doctor into Mr. 
Fitzmanrice, who seized him by the throat, and plunged 
him into a bog-hole, where he attempted to stifle him, 
while, in endeavouring to remonstrate, he could do nothing 
himself but bark and bay like a hound, until at length a 
burst of laughter from his tormentor made him look up, 
when he saw that it was his own dead father who stood 
above him. He was impressed with this conversation 
from no other evidence than the arbitrary feeling of a 
dream, for he neither remembered his father's countenance, 
nor was there in that of the vision the least resemblance 
to any one that he had ever seen. The tenor which the 
sight occasioned him went on deepening in rapid gradations 
until an oppression seized him which proceeded almost to 
a point of suffocation. It was, in fact, a fit of nightmare 
which had been induced, and he speedily fell into that 
state of mental consciousness, and mental as well as bodily 
impotence, which constitutes one of the most terrific 
stages of the disease. His brow and limbs became bathed 
with perspiration in the vain efforts which he made to 
relieve himself. His eyes opened, and he distinctly saw 
the material objects which surrounded him; yet the 
visions of his sleep not only in part continued, but began 
to assume a frantic sort of reality, from the manner in 
which they became combined with these objects. Hia 
Waking ejes began to take tlic part of his yet unregulated 



THE AYLMF.RS OF BALLY-AYLMER. 71 

»nd delirious fan< y, and he beheld, or at least strongly ima- 
gined he beheld, the figure of an old man standing by 
his bedside, holding back the curtain with one hand, while 
the other hung in perfectly motionless repose by his side. 
His form was so placed, that the dreamer could see little 
more than the strongly-marked outline of the shape and 
face, which the intercepted moon-light kad pencilled out 
with the most perfect distinctness, and mellowed by a 
silver line of light, which corrected its harshness, while it 
revealed its character and expression in all their vigour. 
By degrees Ayhner's glance became settled and fixed itself 
full upon the figure. The lips, which were before parted 
with an expression of kindness, began to move at length, 
and another of the young man's senses was called in to 
bear testimony to the reality of the appearance. 

" I am come to warn you, William Aylmer, of a danger 
in which you are placed. Listen to me, for it is your 
father that speaks to you ". 

The young man attempted to stretch out his hands, and 
speak, but the effort failed, and the words died in indistinct 
murmurs upon his lips. 

" Listen, but do not speak", continued the figure, " for 
the night is flying fast, and the clouds are already gray in 
the east. You have heard of your father's death — the 
hand that plunged him living into the waters, was that of 
Cahill Fitzniaurice. Beware of him, for he called himself 
my friend for five-and-twenty years, and yet was not 
ashamed to take me unawares in an hour of weakness and 
of sin. He sought my life while I staggered in drunk- 
enness upon the deck that I had died with unatoned blood". 

Ayhner's countenance expressed the horror mingled 
with curiosity which this last intimation bad excited 
within him. His informant perceived the meaning of the 
gesture, and proceeeded : — 

" In that affair Cahill had no part. I had taken out the 
vessel unaccompanied by him* oud iu the emu'wis-e that 



72 THE AYLMERS OF BALLY-AYLMER. 

followed, the blood of a king's servant was shed. W« 
thought more of the peril, then, than of the crime. I 
have since learned to think more of the crime than of the 
peril. Mine was not the hand, thank Heaven, that dealt 
the blow, nor mine the tongue that directed it ; but in me, 
nevertheless, the guilt originated, and the hand of Fitz- 
maurice only anticipated the vengeance of the law. But 
these things are past. I have come now to warn you 
of another matter. Avoid the company of your guardian's 
daughter ! Let all things rest as they are at least for two 
months, in the space of which time you shall see me again. 
Till then touch not her hand nor listen to her voice, as 
you value your parent's peace. To Fitzmaurice I would 

have you say " 

The slapping of a door in another apartment suddenly 
cut short the intended commission, and as the figure 

" started like a guilty thing 
Upon a fearful summons — " 

Aylmer had a momentary view of the face, as the moon 
shone full upon it. There was an appearance of age, a 
paleness in the complexion probably heightened by the 
peculiar light, and long ilaxen locks depending around 
either temple. The expression of the countenance, during 
the instant, was that of anxiety and intense attention. 
On a repetition of the sound, the strange midnight visitor 
dropt the curtain which he had been holding, and with a 
low and gentle farewell blessiug, uttered with the softest 
aud kindest tone in the world, such as the lip of a parent 
alone can breathe, and the heart of a child alone can 
appreciate, the appearance fled. 

Aylmer, in the effort which he made to detain thft 
vision, both by voice and action, found that his nightmare 
had completely left him, and that, in fact, he had been 
lying wide awake for a considerable time, though eon- 
gciooaue&s hud stolen by such imperceptible gradations 



THE AYLMERS OF BALLY-AYLMER. 13 

upon him, that he could not tell at what period of the 
scene that passed he had been waking, and when he slept. 
It did not, however, escape the metaphisical eye of the 
young collegian, that the bed curtain had become wrink- 
led in the grasp of the spectre, precisely in the same man- 
ner as it would have done if the limb had been composed 
of material flesh and blood. He sprung from his bed, 
and rushed in the direction by which the appearance had 
departed. There was no person in the room, but a little 
search satisfied him that there existed no necessity either 
for a sliding panel, or the other resource, an impassible 
state of being, to aid his visitor's flight, for the room door 
stood a-jar. It certainly was a very vulgar exit for a ghost, 
but the probability that it had been used was more than 
feasible. 

The morning broke before Aylmer was enabled to sub- 
due, in any degree, the feverish excitement which this 
occurrence had induced. The dawn was cold and com- 
fortless, and the cold drifts of snow, amid which it was 
ushered in, prolonged the greyish mistiness of its twi- 
light a considerable space beyond its customary duration. 
Without waiting to form any resolution as to the imme- 
diate line which it would be necessary for him to pursue, 
further than might be suggested by the feverish impulse 
of the moment, and with his heart and mind and frame 
all glowing and trembling with the energy of the terrific 
discovery which he had chanced upon, he found himself 
hurrying almost instinctively along the passage which led 
to the sleeping room of Fitzmaurice, in a distant corner of 
the building. The chamber of the murderer ! — his father's 
murderer ! He scarcely knew — he never once thought of 
asking himself what his design was in thus breaking in up- 
on the morning slumbers of the old man ; but he had an 
indistinct, unsifted motive within his breast, which promp- 
ted him to take the criminal (if the spirit had not lied), by 
surprise, and startle the truth from its resting place within 
I 



1A THE AYLMERS OF BALLY-AYLMER. 

his soul. A sensation too, perhaps, similar to that which 
is uttered by the ill-fated Danish prince, in a situation of 
equal perplexity, might have mingled itself with this unde 
fined purpose : — 

" The spirit that I have seen 

May be a devil ; and the devil hath power 
To assume a pleasing shape ; yea — and, perhaps, 
Out of my weakness and my melancholy 
(As he is very potent with such spirits), 
Abuses me, to damn me : I'll have grounds 
More relative than this — " 

"The sudden "Who's there?" that struck his ear as 
he stirred the door-handle, showed him that the old 
man had not been surprised in slumber by the awaking 
day. Without making any answer, he burst in tremulous 
agitation into the apartment, when the excess of feeling 
which swelled his bosom and rushed into his throat, 
compelled him to stop for a moment, and almost gasp 
for breath. He flung himself at last into an arm-chair 
by the bed-side, where he lay back for a few moments, 
oppressed plmost to suffocation with the host of fearful 
and conflicting sensations that had been stirred up within 
him. The horror of his guardian's crime — the memory 
of all his kindness — pity for his present sufferings, and 
the natural instinct that prompted him to the course of 
justice, all contended for mastery within his soul, and 
made havoc of the region in their strife. It was the first 
time that the spear had been struck into the dwelling- 

J)lace of his stormy passions, and they bounded from their 
lold with all the ungovernable fury which the novelty and 
fierceness of the excitement was calculated to produce. - 
The old man had flung back the bed-curtain, and sitting 
erect, gazed with an expression of amazement, cf terror, and 
cruel anxiety, upon the strange emotion in his young friend. 
Fear, and (an uncharitable observer might say an instinc- 
tive consciousness of its cause, prevented his questioning the 



TOE AYLMERS OF BALLY-AYLMER. 75 

latter, on whom his wild, flickering gaze continued tc 
direct itself while he waited with panting heart, gasping 
lips, and cheeks and brow made cadaverous with the dread 
Of the coming horror, for the first speech of the youth. 

At length their glances met, and the effect was elec- 
trical. Rising slowly to his feet, and uplifting his clenched 
hand above his head, while that and every other momber 
of his frame shook with convulsive energy, and his voice 
became thick and hoarse, and his eyes grew red and 
watery with passion, he said : — 

" Cahill Fitzmaurice, confess to your God and to me, 
for the time is come at length. You are the murderer of 
my father!" 

A low muttering groan, and then a gurgling in the 
throat of the accused, were the only answer which the 
accuser received. The curtain fell from the hand of the 
former, and he lay back riiotionless on the bed. Fully 
prepared, as he had been, for the conviction of guilt, 
which the seeming criminal's conscience thus afforded, its 
effect on Aylnier was not the less powerful when it flashed 
upon him in all its certainty. He felt a sickness at the 
heart, a sudden shooting at the eyes, and a reeling in his 
brain, which nearly made him stagger from his balance. 
Pressing both hands close upon his brow, as if to crush 
the burning thoughts that were rioting within, he hurried 
out of the chamber, just as Miss Fitzmaurice, in a night- 
dress and slippers and with a countenauce full of alarm, 
entered it by another door. 

When he reached his own apartment, he gave full vent 
to the whirlwind of emotions which he had been eu- 
deavonring to restrain during the last half-hour, and flung 
himself upon the bed in a convulsion of feeling. It was 
one of those great and extraordinary occasions which, oc- 
curring when the character is matured by time and 
experience, serve only to strengthen or call forth its 
peculiarities, and wear their channels deeper in the heart ; 



76 THE AYLMEP.S OF BALLT- A.YLMER. 

but which, when they come into contact with a youthful, 
undecided, and susceptible mind, can shake it to its very 
foundation, and mark its course for gocd or ill through life. 
The young man, who had lain down to rest the evening 
before, a raw, unformed, unfledged spirit, now rose from 
the bed, a fiery, austere, and resolute being, with a shadow 
of sternness and gloom struck into his heart, which clung 
to it during all his after-life. 

After the first shock of his agitation was at an end, and 
he had, not without a passing emotion of shame at his 
own weakness, reduced his over-wrought spirits into some 
degree of calmness, he determined instantly to repair to 
Ballv-Aylmer, and there deliberate on the course which it 
would be necessary for him to adopt. 

He flung his loody about him, and regardless of the 
6now which drifted in large flakes into his face, he pro- 
ceeded towards his family residence. 

In the mean time, Katharine had hurried to the bed- 
side of her parent. She had been awakened from her light 
sleep in the apartment next his (which she always oc- 
cupied) by the first sound of Aylmer's entering; and 
unknowing the came of the intrusion, while she felt in- 
dignant that any disturbance should be made in his 
chamber at that early hour, she hurried on some careless 
additions to her night-dress, and entered the room at the 
very moment the door closed on Aylmer's receding figure. 
Her anxieties being, in the first place, aroused for the 
immediate conditiun of the old man, she walked rapidly to 
the bed, and removing the hangings, discovered, in the 
gray morning light, a spectacle that made her heart recoil 
with horror. He lay, half supported by the head of the 
bed, his jaw hanging, and his eyes watery and motionless, 
fixed in a stare ot stolid terror upon the ground, his 
forehead covered with a death-like moisture, and his cheeks 
and lips tinged with the cold, bluish colour which is cast 
over the features in the extreme agony, and is recognized 



THE AYLMERS OF BALLY-ALT MEB. 77 

as the liveried hue of the grave. Uttering a half- 
suppressed scream of anguish, the affrighted girl wound 
one arm around the head of her parent, and supported it 
upon her bosom, while she pressed the other in an agony 
of suspense upon his heart. The organ of life had sus- 
pended its function for a short time, and was now, throb 
after throb, slowly resuming its office. 

The chamber-door soon after opened, and Norry hurried 
to the assistance of her mistress. While the latter en- 
deavoured to rccal sensation by the usual physical appli- 
cations and resources, sprinkling the face with cold water, 
chafing the temples, and placing the body in a horizontal 
position, the unsophisticated attendant took the more 
effectual course of forcing open the stiff clenched ringers rf 
the right hand, and making the sign of the cross with her 
thumb upon the palm. This feat accomplished, she stood 
thumping her bosom, and awaiting its effect in perfect 
faith, at the bed's foot. 

"Don't mind any more o' the water, Miss Cauthleen; 
the little criss-crass I made in his hand will soon lift him 
out o' the fit : it's the gentlemen, God speed 'em (here 
she crossed herself, and curtsied with much devotion), 
that were wantin to hoise him away with them this morncn". 

"Hush! hush! girl! fall back out of the light — he is 
recovering, God be thanked and praised !" 

"Guilty — aye — guilty!" muttered the still unconscious 
object of their solicitude. 

" God save us ! Do you hear him, miss ? " 

"His senses are wandering yet". 

" Where — where is he ? Kate, my girl, you shall bear 
witness to this — call him ! call him back ! " 

" Whom, my dear father 'i> — William ?" 

" Mister Ayliner is gone off, miss ", said Norry. 

" Gone 1 1 am lost ! Ungrateful boy ! if i wronged 
the tather, did I not serve the sou? Haste! call him 
back ! he has my life iu his hands ". 



78 THE AYLMERS OF BALLY-A VLMER. 

"Quit the room, Norry!" exclaimed Katharine, stamping 
her foot against the boards with an expression of anger 
which was foreign to her nature. The servant obeyed, 
after a world of wondering gestures, crossings, and 
muttered ejaculations. 

The violence of the acuon served, in some degree, to 
recal Fitzmaurice to a perfect consciousness of his situation. 

"What! Kate, my gentle Kate, grown passionate?" he 
said, in wonder and tenderness, as he took her warm hand 
in his, and gazed still with some expression of listlessness 
into her eyes: " These veins have young and boiling blood 
within them, my little girl. You must learn to temper 
and subdue it in time, or it will lay the seeds of a bitter 
old age, and a fearful death for you ". 

"I will, sir — you are better, are you not, father?'* 
said the daughter, regarding the speech as a part of the 
lingering delirium which had seized him, and affecting to 
coincide with it, in the light and cursory manner which 
one uses to satisfy the sufferer on all such occasions; 
and than which nothing can be more irritating, if the 
person towards whom it happens to be adopted should at 
all suspect its motive. 

"You treat me like a child", said Fitzmaurice, with 
sharpness ; " no matter. It may be the time is not far 
distant, when it will be the act of a fool to mutter a word 
of reason in my ears ", he continued, passing his hand over 
his brow, and turning his eyes wildly from her glance. 
" Yes. Many that have ate and drank at my board, would 
only eat and drink the freer, when the master of the house 
was in Swift's Hospital. And the mistress of Kilavariga 
would smile as merrily too. She would be her own 
mistress then. Go, go ! You are like the rest. Go from 
me, girl, go from me ". 

Shocked and wounded as she was by these expressions, 
the horrible indications by which they were accompanied 
were more than sufficient to stiile all the selfish feelings of 



THE AYLMERS OF BALLY- AYLMER. 79 

wronged and undervalued affection, which would at any 
other time have burned like a fever stroke within the 
breast of the devoted girl. Persisting, notwithstanding 
his pettish repulses, in clinging around her father's neck, 
she sobbed and wept upon his shoulder, until she felt an 
assurance of relenting in the renewed pressure of the hand, 
which he still retained. 

"I did not, indeed, think of what I was saying, sir", 
she exclaimed, in her most repentant tones, perceiving at 
once that the surest way of redeeming her error, was by 
adopting the directly opposite course. " But. why will not 
my father confide in me ? I am no longer a child, in 
whom one should fear to repose a trust, nor am I in- 
capable of feeling and participating in the grief, the 
secret grief, whatever it is, that is weighing down your 
heart. Do you not feel I love you, father ? Have yoc 
not been my only friend from my very childhood ? Has 
not all that I prize and reverence most, my knowledge of 
right and wrong, my perception of virtue, my religion, 
been all taught me by you, and you only ? and how could 
I, if I were of the worst nature in the world, do otherwise 
than dearly love and honour you?" 

Surprised, and not a little pleased with the energy and 
fervour with which the gentle girl made her appeal, the 
old man paused a moment, while he surveyed her with a 
moistened and affectionate eye. The very last phrase 
which she used, however, appeared to jar against his 
thought, and interrupt the kindly feeling that had begun 
to diffuse itself over his breast. His brow contracted, and 
he mused for a moment. 

" Aye, Kate ", said he, " but will you continue to hold 
this sentiment ? Suppose the time should come when none 
but you could or would do other than i-evile and hate me, 
do you think you would continue to honour your old, and 
perhaps erring, bat fond, fond parent ? n 

" It was the commandment of the Eternal God Him- 



80 THE ATLMERS OF BALLY-AfLMER. 

self, exclaimed the maiden, in a burst of staid en* 
thusiasm, " delivered amid the lightnings and thunders of 
the Holy Mountain, 'Honour thy Father and Mother!' 
and there was no reservation found upon the tablet of 
stone. Man may persecute, sickness may change, grief 
may depress, poverty may chill, or guilt may blacken the 
heart of a parent, but the bonds of the child are never 
loosened ". 

"Then, should the world call me a guilty wretch, and 
prove me little less, I may still have a daughter ?" 

" When that day comes, father, I will say my eyes and 
ears arc false, and trust my heart alone, that will speak 
for you against them ". 

The old man reclined against the head of the bed for a 
few moments, while his eyes closed and his lips moved in 
silence. Then, without altering his position, he waved his 
hand gently, and said in a soft and broken tone : 

" Leave me, Kate, for a few minutes to myself. I will 
look for you in the parlour. Clear all signs of anxiety 
from your countenance, and prepare yourself for a mournful 
confidence ". 

Katharine obeyed in silence, and her father, after per- 
forming the duties of the toilet, began to deliberate within 
his own mind the events of the morning, and their most 
probable consequences. 

It was a passing comfort to him to know, that he had 
at last found one to whom he might show himself such as 
he really was, without meeting that quick repulsive horror 
and distrust, which he feared worse than conscience ; and 
yet it was a bitter humiliation to be reduced to the 
necessity of lowering himself in the eyes of his own child, 
rind directing those feelings of terror and detestation at 
vice which his own instructions had generated in her mind, 
against himself in person. For one moment, an in- 
voluntary wish escaped him, that he bad reared his 
daughter with a somewhat less acute susceptibility of the 



THE AYLMERS OF BALLY-AYLMER. 81 

hideottsncss of crime, and a more qualified admiration of 
its opposite, than now formed the groundwork of her 
clwracter. It was but a glance of thought, however, in 
which neither his reason nor his feeling had any par- 
ticipation, and was forgotten even before it was con- 
demned. He concluded by determining to make the 
confidence which he meditated, and after praying, for the 
first time in many a year, with a somewhat lightened 
spirit, he descended to the parlour, where Katharine was 
awaiting him. 

The young lady in the mean time had been occupied 
with doubts and conjectures of an equally agitating, 
though a less gloomy character. Notwithstanding the 
warmth of feeling, into which she had been hurried by the 
enthusiasm of her affection during the preceding scene, 
ehe was very far from anticipating, even in thought, the 
possibility that her filial love could be put to so extreme 
a test as her words declared it capable of surviving, and 
she looked for nothing more in truth than her father had 
himself led her to expect — "a mournful confidence". 
Even the wild and haggard air which was about his 
features and actions as he entered the room, were in- 
sufficient to lead her to suspect that his promised secret 
could comprise any thing of a darker or more fearful hue. 

He motioned his daughter to keep her seat, and after 
glancing along the passage by which he approached, 
closed the door and slipped the little bolt into its p'ace. 
Then, after pacing up and down the room several times, 
as if debating with himself the easiest mode of opening a 
conversation so replete with humiliation to one party, and 
horror to the other, as that which he was about to enter 
upon, he stopped opposite his daughter's chair, and fixing 
his eye, all lighted up as it was with a thousand fearful 
emotions, on her mild and tenderly anxious glance, he said: 

" You know not, perhaps, or have not con.-iderc I the full 
extent of the consequence which you draw upon your e'f 
4* 



82 THE AYLMEKS OF BALLY-AYLMER. 

by urging me to this confidence. You have not had time 
to think on the subject, how deeply and closely it will 
involve your peace of mind, nay, perhaps your health of 
soul — how intimately and perfectly your fate must become 
intertwined with that of him, into whose secret heart you 
are now about to penetrate unbidden ". 

" There must be safety, father ", said the girl, a little 
startled and confounded by the strangeness of his manner, 
" there must be peace, wherever you lead me ". 

" Do nothing on presumption ", was his reply. " I 
wish you to pause, and ponder well, before you have my 
secret, for when it is once told, I shall hold you bound to 
me, and to my service, more firmly than ever, though 
perhaps not equally to my love ". 

The last words were uttered in so mournful a tone that 
the current of Katharine's feelings, which had been a 
little disturbed and qualified by the mysticism of the 
previous speech, again rushed into their old channel. Her 
eyes filled up as she grasped her parent's hand in hers, 
and wetting it with tears of filial love and reverence, she 
said, in hurried, and yet irresolute accents : 

" father, I do not know what you mean, or what I 
a.n to fear; but speak — speak, in God's name; whatever 
it is that troubles you ought not to be spared to me. If 
it be a sorrowful tale, I may make its memory sit lighter 
on your heart, and two, at least, can bear the burden 
better than one. If it be guilt that — guilt" (she shud- 
dered and was silent one instant, as she detected a word 
on her lips, which her will had not directed them to utter) 
— "forgive me, sir, that cannot be, I know — No, father, 
no", in increasing agony, as she read not the indignant 
denial she looked so eagerly for in his cold and marbly eye 
— "you have taught me to love virtue, to adore God, to 
fear His anger, to deserve His mercy. Father! speak! 
speak to me — " 

"Peace, girl!" said the old man sadly, yet sternly; 



THE AYLMERS OF BALLY-A1 UIER. 88 

"attribute not to the inactive instrument the music which 
was made by the divine breath that filled and the hand 
that governed it. He who holds a light to another, is most 
like to fall himself. Sit still, and hear me". And replacing 
the trembling girl in the chair, which in her agitation she 
had left, he stood close at her side, and after a pause, 
began : 

" You have heard of the circumstances which attended 
the death of William's father?" 

"Yes, yes, sir!" replied Kate, in a low and hurried tone, 
with a horrible failure and sinking at her heart. 

" When he died, there was but one friend at his side". 
As he proceeded, the sallow and ashy countenance of the 
old man became deepened in hue by the rushing of the 
scanty currents of life into channels which they had long 
ceased to visit, and his eye became gradually fiercer and 
fiercer, as the fear and horror that oppressed his daughter 
became more manifest in her look and attitude. "Sit 
erect, girl, and hear me steadily. You have forced me 
to say what, except in madness, I thought mortal ears 
should never hear me utter, and you must abide the conse- 
quence. Sit still, then, and do not flinch or waver, while 
I speak to you, as you value your father's reason". 

" I will, sir. I am not terrified", whispered the bewil- 
dered girl, while a strange mixture of anxiety and listless- 
ness became blended iu the gaze which she now bent on 
the old man. 

"The two friends", he continued, after a pause of 
fearful recollection, " were sitting together by the little 
brick hob in the hooker's cabin, and talking gaily enough 
about the work they had both been about. Friends 
leagued in crime are but light lovers, though their bonds 
are the stronger by the addition of fear and community of 
guilt, than those which simple liking ties. Few words 
were necessary to bring the frown and the taunt where 
the laugh and the jest were seen and heard a little while 



84 THE AYLMERS OF BALLY-AYLMER. 

before. A sharp speech provoked a blow, and the friend- 
ship of a long life was dissolved as suddenly as life itself, 
when the deathstroke touches it. The man who received 
the indignity remained silent and gloomy during the 
remainder of the evening. Although he did not refuse his 
hand when the aggressor sued for reconciliation, the 
disgrace was festering at his heart. Soon after, a dark 
and foggy night came on. Both these men ascended on 
deck to speak at greater freedom, and draw a somewhat 
purer air than that of the close and smoky cabin where 
they bad been lying just before. At a moment when the 
vessel heeled more deeply than usual before the blast, 
while the steersman was busy at the helm, and his mate 
with the forcsheet — and while the two stood alone and 
unseen (though not unheard) upon the forecastle — one 
roaring, laughing, and unsteady with drunkenness and 
with triumph ; the other equally intoxicated, but after a 
darker and more sullen fashion, and from a different cause, 
the aggressor staggered a little, reeled, and overhung the 
lee-gunwale. The opportunity flashed like lightning upon 
the heart of his enemy ; he darted on him, and in the 
fierce effort almost precipitated his own fate and mingled 
it with that of his victim. The fluke of an anchor, 
however, caught in a part of his frieze great coat, and he 
hung suspended between both worlds, while the dying 
shrieks of his victim, the gurgling of the death struggle, 
the angry dash of the waters, and the w hirring of the wild 
gale, sounded in his ears like the din of the last judgment. 
He was saved, however. The vessel swept on, and the 
voice of the dying man was speedily lost in the distance. 
A lie protected his destroyer". 

The old man here paused and sunk back in his chair, 
exhausted by the fierceness and horror of his recollected 
sensations; while his daughter sat stooping forward, her 
eyes fixed in motionless horror upon his, and every 
feature bent up, and set hard in an expression of de- 



THE AYLMEUS OK BALLY-AYLMEfi. 85 

vouring attention ; her limbs and frame stiffening with the 
anguish of the dreadful suspense in which the old man's 
pause had left her, 

" as if each other sense 

Were Imund in that of hearing, and each word 
Struck through it with an agony ". 

At length he resumed in a faint and hoarse tone, 
without daring to lift his eyes toward his auditor : " The 
man who died on that night was Robert Aylnier; and his 
murderer was ". 

Uttering a low, yet piercing scream of agony, the 
wretched girl cast herself at the feet of her guilty father, 
in an attitude of deprecation and entreaty. 

" No, no, you will not say it, sir. Oh ! do not, in the 
name of the Heaven you have taught me to venerate, 
plunge us both into such a gulf of horror. What! my 
father ! my kind, good father, in whose bosom I have been 
fondled — whose lips I have kissed — whose hand has blest 
me morning and evening for fifteen years — my dear, dear 
father, do a deed so full of horror and crime — a murderer, 
a secret murderer! — Ha! " with a cry of exultation, as a 
momentary flush of burning pride and shame, the impulse 
of an nncalculating instinct, passed over the brow of the 
old man at the branding epithet, — " I sec it there — I 
knew it could not be ; you are not he of whom you spoke, 
father? Forgive, forgive me, sir, for so cruel, so insulting 
an anticipation of your words". 

"It is too late for recanting them now", said Fitz- 
maurice quietly, but with a dreadful ghastliness in his eye: 
" the blood of my oldest friend is on ray hands ; I have 
told my sin, and my soul is lighter ". 

" Good Heaven ! blessed mother of God ! " muttered 
Katharine, as she rose from her knees, and passed one 
hand in a trembling and hurried manner over her fore- 
bead and about her loosened hair, while her eye became 



86 THE AYLMERS OF BALLY-AYLMEB. 

fixed in stupid terror on the earth. A silence of temble 
reflection to both ensued. Fitzmaurice perceived, at a 
glance, that he had for ever lost the esteem of his child. 
That was bitter. Katharine beheld, in one short hour, the 
peace, the happiness of her whole existence withered and 
parched up ; her duty made burdensome as crime ; her 
heart's warmest and best affections made grievous to her 
soul, its faith disproved, its idol broken down, and the 
shrine of its worship polluted and made desolate. This 
was more bitter still. 

After a pause of some minutes, Fitzmaurice approached 
her and held out his hand. She shuddered, and shrunk 
back upon herself with an involuntary action and a half- 
stifled exclamation of repugnance. He attempted to 
smile, but his lip grew pale, and his brows were knit iu 
anguish at the change. 

"I thought this, Kate", he said, sadly; "but I do not 
blame you for it. And yet it is a sad promise to me of 
what I am to expect from a malignant and suspicions 
world, when my own daughter, whom I have reared and 
cared for now sixteen years, shrinks from my touch as if 
it were that of a viper ". 

Perceiving that this appeal was ineffectual, and that the 
stroke had been too hardly dealt on his daughter's heart, 
Fitzmaurice continued, rising: "And now, Kate, though 1 
put your affection to a strong test before I spoke to yon on 
this, you shall not find me ungenerous enough to profit by 
the hasty enthusiasm of the moment. I have lost your 
love. I grieve for it, but I do not blame yon. Yet, 
w ithout your love I will never allow your service nor com- 
panionship. Go yon out at that door — I will take this; 
and let that be our final parting. Go, my loved, my in- 
jured child ; forget your miserable father, — think of him as 
of one departed, but not in crime — for that would make his 
memory bitter to you, — but as one who erred, and found 
the grace that Heaven treasures for the penitent. Another 



THE AYLMERS OF BALLY-ATLMER. 87 

land must be my refuge from the retribution which 
my guilt demands, and must afford me time to la- 
bour for that divine grace. Farewell, Kate; go and 
be gay, and happy, and innocent as ever, and leave 
your old parent to his guilt, his sorrow, and his soli- 
tude". 

This speech had the effect on his hearer which the 
speaker wished and intended. The sluices of her soft and 
feminine passions had been all dammed and clicked up, 
almost to suffocation, by the grand and overwhelming 
horror that had been thrown about her, and only wanted 
a single pressure on the master-spring, one whisper in the 
ear of the heart, to set them flowing again, in all the 
impetuosity of interrupted feeling. She flung herself into 
her father's arms, and twined her own around his neck, 
while she leaned her head against his bosom in a 
hysterical passion of grief. 

"No, no, father!" she exclaimed, as soon as she could 
give words to her affliction, " part we shall not, at least. 
Whatever you may have been to others, you have been 
always kind, and tender, and good to me, and my hand 
must not be the first to cast the stone at my only friend. 
The changes of the world can affect us but little, for we 
have always lived more to ourselves than to it ; and a life 
of loneliness will be nothing more than a prolonging of 
past quiet. Yes, father, my resolution is taken. If you 
must leave home for ever, you take all my home with you; 
and, for my own heart's ease, I must follow it ". It can 
hardly be said (for thoughts will often come unbidden, 
and make obstinate battle with the will), that we charge 
the gentle and affectionate Kate with any selfishness of 
feeling, in acknowledging that, while she spoke the last 
sentence, a new thought, a new fear, and a new pang, 
darted into her heart, and seemed for the moment to have 
almost cleft it asunder. William Aylmer 1 She gasped 
for breath, while her aged parent folded her to his 



88 THE AYLMERS OF BALLY-AYLMER. 

breast, and moistened her neck with the first tears he 
had shed for many days. 

We will close the scene on this afflicted pair, and cast 
our eyes for a short while in another direction. 

It will be recollected that Sandy Culhane had received 
directions from William Aylmer to hold in readiness for 
him on this morning the horse on which he was about to 
bear the intercepted letter to Hasset Ville. The wiuter 
dawn had scarcely whitened in the east, when he was at 
his post in tne old stable, preparing the animal for the 
appointment. He was busied after his usual fashion, 
rubbing down the pleased and sleek-coated beast with a 
" wisp " of straw, while he puffed away the clouds of dust 
that enveloped his person and hummed out an occasional 
bar of his favourite madhereen rhu* interrupted by 
"hirrups! stand overeroo! hiss — ss — ss — ss— the little 
'omancen you were— aizy!" when a "God bless all 
here", from the darkening doorway, suspended his 
labours ; he looked up and beheld an old mau in a gray 
friize dress leaning against the jamb, and throwing his 
head on one side, to screen it from the snow that drifted 
across. It was the herdsman of Kilavariga. 

" Yeh, then, isn't it airly you're goen roven this inornen, 
Mick ? What's the murder now ? " 

" Whist ! whist ! Sandy. I have something to say to 
you.- Will she kick?" 

" 0, sorrow a taste ! Aizy, you born jade, and let the 
nayburs come iu ", as he observed the animal throw back 
its ears, and use a menacing gesture towards the intruder. 
The latter shook down an armfid of the sweet hay in a 
corner of the stable, and seating himself on it iu a fair-and- 
easy Irish way, commenced business at once. 

" Have you air a thief in your house, Sandy, that wears 
brogues and pavers ?" 

Sandy stared as he replied : "A thief, Mick, eroo ? Bad 
* LittU red fox. 



THE AYLMERS OF BALLY-AYLMEB. S9 

fcess to the thief at all in our house, wit or without the 
pavers ". 

The herdsman paused, and seemed to take thought for 
a moment ; then glancing at Randy's well greased dogskin 
shoes, he beckoned him to follow to a little distance, where 
a long track of footsteps intersected the plain, white 
surface of the snow-covered lawn. 

"Would you look here, Sandy?" said he. "The 
master's turf-rick, the slane turf, was broken last night, 
and I traced those steps over the little haggard wall, aud 
through the paddock, and by the forge, and here, all the 
ways to Bally-Aylmer. 'Tis hard to tell the marks o' 
these steps now, for it was snowen since they wor made, 
but here's one of 'em close be the wall, put the print o' 
your crubeen a-nigh that, av you plase ". 

Sandy indignantly stamped his foot in the snow, and 
the investigator, after viewing both impressions, shook his 
head, as if disappointed. 

" They are quite different. There's pavers here wit 
heads as big as tin-pinnies, and yours hasn't only toe-tacks 
in 'em, like the gintlemin". 

"Why then, you lahu-muthawn* o* the airth ! " ex- 
claimed the insulted Sandy, now that the cause of the 
herdsman's action was so unmincingly announced, "is it 
mailing that it was meself was at your ould turf-reek you 
wor?" 

" Aisy, aisy, now, Sandy ! " said the other, moving on 
before him towards the stable, with one arm resting on his 
back, under his long coat skirts, and motioning him back 
with the other. "There's no offince. I seen the print of 
a handsome, clever foot in the snow, and where was I to 
look for it, av it wasn't with Sandy Culhane ? But sure 
I ought to know better, for you shamed it out intirely 
whin you put your own a-near it. Sure av I wasn't 
blind, I ought to know, that ic isn't seen a piob of a fut 
* Half-natural. 



90 THE AYLMERS OF BALLY-ATLMEB 

as that abroad, that could bother Norry Kilmartin'g 
dreams". 

With a heroic effort at forbearance, Sandy mastered his 
indignation, and complacently glancing down at a hideously 
formed foot, followed the herdsman into the stable, where 
he recommenced his labours on the ecclesiastical sides of 
the well-conditioned quadruped, while the former resumed 
his seat and meditative air on his heap of fresh hay. 

" It's droll still who the brogues belonged to ", he con- 
tinued, after a pause, " but all is one ; for if I was to 
bring him in bound hand an fut to the master, he'd be the 
first to let him off himself. What do you think did be do 
the other day, only relase the Barret's pzaties from the 
cant, and bid him say nothen about the trifle o' the rent 
that was due, but to set to work agen, fresh on a clear gale ?" 

" Wisha, the Barrets are poor craturs ! " was all Sandy's 
reply. 

" More's the pity to be losing to 'em, since it does 'em 
so little good". 

" Did you ever hear the ould fable of Jack Finnane and 
the white-eyes ? " said Sandy. 

" To be sure I didn't ; for what should I ?" 

" Sit aisy then, and I'll tell you it. This Mr. John 
Finnane, you see, was a kind of a half-sir, a middleman, 
that used to be great long ago, letting out land in acres, 
and half-acres, and quarter-acres to the poor people, that 
would may be want a gwal* of pzaties coming on the idle 
season ; and a hard and a bitter landlord he was to the 
poor fellows that wouldn't have the rent agen the gale 
day, and good care he took, I'll be bound, that not a single 
connoppf ever left the airth ant'l every camackj was 
paid, dead gale and all. Signs on, it often chanced, as 
most like it was, that the poor tinants, not having the 
difference o' the rint, used to go into the pzatie fields at 
uight, pulling up the stalks and filling their little Jack 

* Armful. t Potato. \ Penny token. 



THE AYLMERS OF BALLY-AYLMEB. 91 

Daws* with what God sent up with the roots, which being 
made known to John Finnane, yon see, he sat np a night 
to know would he catch any of the plunderers at their 
doings, which they having notice of, didn't come, as why 
should they ? being marked for the quarter sessions, surely. 

"Well! 'twas coming on midnight, and Mr. Finnane 
being as it were tired with himself, sat down on a ridge of 
the pzaties, with his feet in the furrow, and he very sleepy, 
it being Jerry Graham's quarter. Tis aisily known he 
opened his eyes wide enough, whin he heard, what do you 
think, only Jerry's white-eyes talking to one another in the 
ground under him! He stooped his head down, and 
began to hearken. * Will you grow any more ? ' says a 
little pzatie to a big one. — ' No, a gra gal ', says the big 
pzatie, ' its big enough I am already '. — ' Well, then ', says 
the other, ' move out o' the way with you a piece, and 
let us grow for Jerry Graham and the craturs'.— ' I'd be 
happy to oblige you then ', says the big pzatie, ' but sure 
it's well you knoAv none of us can stir from our places an 
inch ontil John Finnane gets his rint '. ' Murther alive ! ' 
says John, crossing himself and thumping his breast 
about, 'are the pzaties themselves cryen out agen me? 
Murther, but that's great intirely'. Home he went, 
wondering, and people say Jerry Graham was bid to dig 
his quarter and welcome next mornen ". 

"E'then, thanky for your parable, Sandy", said the 
herdsman, " bnt may be we'd find one on the other side, 
for an open hand isn't always the luckiest after all ". 

Sandy suffered his arm to rest on tho shoulder of the 
animal he was tending, and placed himself in an attitude 
of attention, while the other, throwing himself back in an 
easy reclining posture, commenced his " fable ". 

"Mr. David Foy had a great heart, but, like the 
master, there was too much of it, for there was no bounds 
at all to his doings, when he took it into his head to spend 
* John Doe, a small bag. 



82 THE AYLJIEUS 0" DALLY-AYLMEB. 

his money ; an having no faraaly nor air a wife that wotJ J 
look after the house and things, every whole tote went 
wrong intirely. Besides, he was great after the hounds ; 
and a fine rider he was, and with seeh a dawny darland 
of a horse, that he one day left the hounds, hunt, hare, an' 
all behind him. On he went, an' he was goen, goen, goen 
(as the ould gossips say), ont'l he came to a great valley 
intirely. And there he saw themselves, in their little 
red jackets, and with caps on their heads, and hurlies in 
their hands, and they playen goal. Well, an ould hag 
that was sitten as it might be this way like meself, see 
David, and made to-wards him with a piggin of something 
that's good, which he refused, and well became him, 
knowen it was not good to take drink from the like. 
' Take it, heart ', says the ould hag, ' and don't spare. It's 
David Foy's cider, and long may he live and reign ; we 
don't want for the best he has, for it's we that get all 
that's wasted in the house by bad looken after, and it's 
good liven we have here, while the poor Christians are 
starving at his door. Take the drop and be comfortable'. 
* Thanky kindly, ma'am ', says David, ' but I rather not, 
av you plase, wit the same thanks to you as if I did ; my 
stomach is not well indeed this mornen, saving your 
favour'. 'No oflince in life, sir', says she. So they sat 
down together. By an by, in comes a struppen young 
Clooricaun with a pailful o' sweet milk. 'Where did you 
get that, eroo?' says the hag. 'E'then long life to Davy 
Foy, where should I get it only out of his dairy? lie 
was out hunten, an Bridget was in the haggart wit Tim 
Fouloo, so I came in for my share wit the cat an the dog '. 
*Sha guthinel is this the way of it ?' says Davy to him- 
self. Then comes in another of the gentry with a firkin 
o' butter, and another with a gammon o' bacon, and all in 
the same story, and Davy himself by all the time, aud not 
one o' them knowen him, in rigard of his never beiug 
about the house, hardly. * "lis little admiration tor ye to 



THE AYLMERS OF BALLY-AYLMER. 93 

be so fat, gintlemin ', says he at last, as he was wishen 
'em a good raornen, at which they all laughed hearty, and 
nodded and winked their little wicked eyes at him, mighty 
merry intirely, as much as to say : ' True for you, lad '. In 
a year after ho came to the same place : the little goal- 
players were nothen but skin and bone, and the old hag 
was scrapen a raw pzatie agen a grater to make a cake for 
their supper. ' Oh, then the Cromaylian curse upon your 
head, David Foy, for we know you now! ' says the whole 
set of 'em together — ' there's all we got losing after you 
this twelvemonth ', showen the raw pzatie the same time. 
'The more my luck', says David, 'wasn't it ycr own 
taiching?'" 

Having, as he believed, fully discomfited Sandy at his 
own weapons, old Michael rose to depart, with the view 
of instituting an inquiry at the neighbouring village 
relative to the owner of the mysterious brogues and 
pavers. 

He was scarcely out of sight, when the back door of 
the dwelling-house opened, and the stranger who had on 
the preceding evening accosted Sandy in the avenue of 
Kilavariga, made his appearance. The latter was busily 
occupied in polishing a stubborn fetlock when the old man 
hurried into the stable. 

"Come, Sandy, saddle the horse, and lead him out 
here", he exclaimed. "I have received a piece of in- 
telligence from Mr. Evans which will render it necessary 
for me to travel fifty miles before night fall. Is the 
animal frost shod?" 

"Quite complate, yer honour. But that's a thing o' 
nothen. Mr. William Aylmer that bid mo have the cratur 
convanient for himself this morning ". 

"Where is he going?" 

" Sarrovv a know do I know ". 

" No matter. Give me the horse, and make out what 
excuse you can for your young master ". 



94 THE AYLMERS OF BALLY-AYLMER. 

"The best I can offer, then", said Sandy as he assisted 
the stranger to mount, " will be to keep out of his way 
intirely, for indeed he's not over honest* when he do be 
crossed ". 

" Kind father for him ", said the stranger laughing. 

" Wonst in his day, sir ", replied Sandy, " but time and 
trouble changes the people ". 

The expression of merriment was instantly quelled on 
the lip of the stranger. He fetched his breath hard, and, 
checking the bridle, rode through the yard gate just as 
Aylmer, wrapped in his great coat, and covered with 
snow-flakes, made his appearance on the avenue. The 
latter used a slight action of surprise, as the other passed 
him at a more rapid pace than he had before employed. 

" He knows the horse ! " said Sandy, " time for me to 
be moven ". And he was about to depart, when the 
young gentleman's voice arrested his flight. 

"Who is that man, Sandy ? " 

" That man sir ? is it ? It's Mick Donovan, sir, 

Mr. Fitzmaurice's herdsman*". 

" He looks more large, and rides better than he used ". 

•'Thriving with him the place is, your honour. — Not a 
word about the horse ! " he added, in some astonishment, 
as Aylmer, with a look of some disappointment, turned of! 
in the direction of the house. "Some trouble at Kilii' 
variga, I'll be bail ". 



The limits which we prescribed to ourselves at the 
commencement of this little tale, render it impossible for 
us to enter into a minute detail of many unimportant cir- 
cumstances which occupied the principal personages during 
the several days which followed the eventful morning 01 
Aylmer's discovery. It will save the reader a great deal 
# Honest is e synonym for mild or gentle, in Ireland. 



THE AYLMEKS OF BALLY -AYLMEB. 95 

of heavy reading, and the historian of the parties a great 
deal of analyzing matter, of speculations on impulse and 
motive, and cloudy talking, if we proceed to the next 
situation of the story with as little preface as possible. 

Fitzmaurice and his daughter having heard nothing 
more of Aylmer, concluded that his resolution was fixed, 
not to enter the house of his old benefactor from that time 
forward. Although the cause of this determination, and 
the apparent probability of her young friend's persevering 
in it, had produced a mournful change both in the heart 
and in the appearance of the livery Katharine, she had ex- 
erted a sufficient degree of mastery over her wounded 
feelings to conceal at least the voluntary expression of her 
suffering from the eye of her parent. Convinced as she 
now was of the depth and intensity of her love for the 
haughty fugitive, and satisfied, even to the very limit of 
utter hopelessness, that no chance or change of cir- 
cumstances could ever again restore the hearts of both to 
the relative position which they had occupied from child- 
hood — satisfied, in a word, that, loving as she did even to 
sickness of soul and frame, she yet loved in vain, it was 
touching to witness the quiet fortitude with which she dis- 
guised those feelings when in the presence of her parent. 
Frequently, indeed, in her wanderings about the lonely 
mansion, when a scattered remembrancer of " past, happy 
hours " caught her eye ; when she looked from her 
window, in the calm and silent even-fall, on the scenes of 
their youthful sports ; or when her hand, unconsciously 
straying over her neglected harp, happened to awaken a 
Cadence of one of his favourite melodies, in those moments 
it was that her bosom would swell and tighten, while the 
sudden passion laboured in her throat, and relieved itself at 
length in bursts of overwhelming grief. But the moment 
her father's footstep sounded on the flagged hall without, 
these signs of anxiety disappeared, and the note of the harp 
was changed to one of a lesser interest and meaning. 



96 THE AYLMERS OF BALLF-AYLMElt. 

The change which had taken place in the disposition 
and manner of the old man was still more striking and 
more rapid. It seemed as if, instead of experiencing any 
relief from the confidence he had made, it only added fresh 
terrors to those which he had so long confined in his own 
bosom, and multiplied the chances and fears of detection 
that had made the last years of his life one long and 
weary chain of anxiety and sorrow. His eye had lost its 
heaviness and gloom, while it assumed instead a rest- 
lessness of glance, and a wildness and distrust in its most 
ordinary expression, which furnished his now more than 
ever vigilant and affectionate daughter with a more 
startling subject for alarm, than even the increased pale- 
ness of his lips and brow and the rapid wasting of his 
sallow cheeks afforded. The sound of a strange footstep, 
the shutting of a door, the whistling of a sudden gust 
around the dreary mansion, any unexpected sight or 
sound, seemed to shake his being to the very centre. At 
those times, too, he was wont to receive the accustomed 
consolations of his daughter with expressions full of a 
sharp and pettish asperity, which, continued, repeated, and 
unatoncd for, as they were, by any after-kindness, put the 
devotion of her filial love to a severer test than even the 
revolting cause in which they originated. With the 
fineness of perception which is so peculiarly the cha- 
racteristic of her sex, she quickly arrived at the mode of 
treatment best adapted for the novel turn which the 
disease had taken. Like the minstrel of the Israelitish 
monarch, when the evil influence came over the mind of 
her patient, she abandoned all efforts to combat it by ar- 
gument, or even condolence, and affected an air of perfect 
abstraction and security, while she ran, as if in careless 
practice, over the chords of her instrument, varying and 
accommodating the character of the melody to the changes 
which were visible in the countenance of the listener, 
with a tact and fidelity which would not have been 



THE ATLMEBS OF BALLY-AYLMEB. 97 

unworthy even of the mighty name which we have before 
mentioned. Yet all this was far from behg remedial, 
and it was even palliative in a very inconsiderable degree. 
They had been sitting together for some time, on the 
moiling of the eighth day from that of Aylmer's departure, 
without interchanging a single sentence beyond the custo- 
mary domestic greetings. The old man sat near the fire, his 
head drooped upon his bosom, and bis eyes fixed with a 
melancholy expression on the clear light blaze of the turfen 
fire before him, while Katharine, accompanying herself on 
her harp, murmured over, sotto voce, the words of a 
popular " keen-the-caun ", the lament of a mother over 
the grave of a beloved son. We give the stanzas : — 



The Christmas light* is burning bright 

In many a village pane ; 
And many a cottage rings to night 

With many a merry strain. 
Young boys and girls run laughing by. 

Their hearts and eyes elate — 
I can but think on mine, and sigh, 

For I am desolate. 

n. 

There's none to watch in our old cot, 

Beside thy holy light ; 
No tongue to bless the silent spot 

Against the parting night.t 
I've closed the door, and hither come 

To mourn my lonely fate; 
I cannot bear my own old home, 

It is so desolate ! 

•The Christmas candle — a light, blest by the priest, and lighted 
at sunset on Christmas-eve, in Irish houses. It is a kind of impiety 
to snuff, touch, or use it for any profane purpose after. 

f It is the custom, in Irish Ca holic families, to sit up till mid- 
night on Christmas-eve, in order to join in devotion at that hour. 
Few ceremonies of the religion have a mo e splendid and imposing 
effect than the morning mass, which, in cities, is celebrated soon 
•iter the hour alluded to, and loug before day-break. 



98 THE AYLMERS OF BALLY-AY l.MEB. 

in. 

I saw my father's eyes grow dim, 

And clasped my mother's knee; 
I saw my mother follow him, 

— My husband wept with me. 
My husband did not long remain, 

— His child was left me yet; 
But now my heart's last love is slain, 

And I am desolate! 

The song was not concluded when both the melodist and 
listener were startled by a quick and vehement knocking 
at the chamber-door. The latter was the first to start 
from his chair in a passion of terror. Before he could 
recover the command of speech or action, the voice of the 
little chambermaid was heard without, imploring instant 
admission, in accents which showed that all the agitation 
was not confined to the interior. Katharine hastily slipped 
back the little bolt, and admitted the eager girl. 

"What is the matter, Norry?" exclaimed her mistress. 

" ma'am we're all zuin'd intircly. master ! " 

pausing, as her eye fell on the ghastly figure of the con- 
science-stricken Fitzmaurice, and fetching her breath fof 
a moment. " Come, come thi3 way, Miss Kate, I want to 
speak a piece wit you ", beckoning the young lady after her. 

" Stay !" cried the old man, hoarsely, " what have you 
seen? Speak, quickly!" 

" Oh, murder, sir ?" Norry cried aloud, wringing her 
hands in agony, " the army, the army,* intirely !" 

" Coming hither ?"' inquired Kate. 

"Two red coats, wit ould Hasset along wit 'em, miss. 
Upon the aveny already ". 

The intelligence seemed almost to have paralysed both 
the mind and frame of Fitzmaurice. He did nothing, 
proposed nothing, and was even listless, helpless, and 
passive, while plan after plan, both of escape and con- 
cealment, was suggested and rejected in rapid succession 

* Any number of soldiers is so called by the Irish peasantry. 



THE ATLMERS OF BALLY-ATLMER. 99 

by the agonized daughter and her faithful and anxious at- 
tendant. "The back window", "the loft", "the turf- 
rick", " between the bed- ticks", " the chimney", were all 
cast aside as stale and hopeless, when, her eyes suddenly 
flashing with a gleam of intelligence, Norry slapped the 
palms of her tough hands together, so as to produce a 
report that echoed through the house like a pistol-shot, 
and startled the old man himself from his lethargy of 
fear. 

"The ould makings of a cupboard", she exclaimed, 
pointing to the pier-glass, " the same plice fare I hid the 
little dog the day the taxman was here, whin he began 
barken in the wall within". 

The proposal was caught up and acted upon instantly. 
The large glass was removed, and a square niche in the 
solid wall, originally intended for a cupboard, was dis- 
closed. Into this recess was the terrified old man hurried 
by the two girls, himself too perfectly overwhelmed with 
apprehension to offer either opposition or assistance to 
thjeir movements. The mirror was then carefully replaced, 
and Katharine, after crossing her hands on her bosom for 
one moment, in a strong effort to master her struggling 
anxieties, and murmuring a brief and anxious petition to 
the throne of mercy, prepared to act her part in the coming 
emergency with the necessary firmness and composure. 

" If he doesn't behave quieter than little Minos, there's 
little chance for him ", said Norry, as she left the room. 

The recollection of this circumstance was a new subject 
of alarm for the sensitive daughter. The story of Miss 
Fitzmaurice's dog, concealed from a tax-gatherer in a 
recess behind the pier-glass, and betrayed by his own 
barking, at the very instant when the old steward was 
leaving a blank for the article "dogs" in the inventory, 
had been so generally circulated, and excited so much 
amusement throughout the country, that there was littla 
hope of its having escaped the ears of Mr. Hasset. For 



100 THE AYLMERS OF BALLY- AYLMER. 

this, however, she had to trust to fortune, as it was now 
too late to alter the position of the old man. 

In a few minutes the magistrate made his appearance. 
He had the delicacy, or the wariness, to forbid the ap- 
proach of his armed attendants, and if it were not for 
the previous intimation of their approach, the young 
hostess would have had no reason to judge this other than 
a visit of mere ceremony. Katharine found herself, for 
the first time in her life, compelled to violate the truth, in 
the answers which she returned to this unwelcome guest. 
She did it, however, with tenderness. 

Was her father at home ? 

He had ridden out (very frequently, understood). 

Whither? 

She had not asked him. 

Did she soon expect him ? 

She believed his return was quite uncertain. 

The magistrate was silent for a few seconds; then 
seeming to Wave formed a sudden resolution, he said : 

" Miss Fitzmaurice will pardon me, but I have a very 
disagreeable duty to perform. The presence of her father 
is absolutely required — and that duty shall not be dis- 
charged until every possible means has been resorted to in 
order to secure it". 

" The doors are open, sir", said Katharine, rising, with 
an assumed haughtiness in her carriage, while her heart 
bounded with terror; "you are at liberty to use your 
authority as you please". 

The young lady left the room, and the soldiers were 
admitted. She remained in the next apartment, listening 
in an agony of the crudest suspense to the movements of 
the searchers within. They prolonged their scrutiny in a 
manner that showed how little reliance their director 
placed on the equivocations of the fair hostess. At times, 
a thrill of fierce terror shot to the very centre of her 
heart, and suspended it3 pulsation, when the footsteps of 



THE AYLMERS OF BALLY- AYLMER. 101 

any of the party approached the hiding-place of the 
criminal. 

" To the next room 1 " said the voice of the magistrate; 
" don't mind the mouse-holes". Katharine felt relief. 

" Easy, sir", exclaimed a fourth man, who had just en- 
tered, and in whose sharp, angular, cunning tones, the 
trembling Kate recognized the voice of Hasset's clerk, a 
gentleman who, to establish his qualifications for the 
situation he held, would very gladly have hanged half the 
parish, if necessary, "you have not done all the bizi.iz 
clean yet". 

Kate grasped the back of a chair, and drew her light 
handkerchief tightly around her neck, while her whole 
frame shivered with a chilling anxiety. 

" Well for ye", she heard the new comer continue, in a 
jeering way, " to have a lad that know's what he's about 
to guide ye. Did none o' ye hear the little matter about 
the dog and the tax-gatherer? Poh !" 

" I remember something of it, I confess, Linehan", said 
Hasset, startled. 

"Try it then now". 

Almost delirious with fear and disappointment, the 
miserable daughter fetched a quick and hoarse breath, and 
bit her lip until the blood forsook it, to prevent her 
screaming aloud. Her limbs shook convulsively, and her 
eyes wandered with the wildness of despair around the 
chamber, while she waited the next movement of the 
inquirers. 

" What are you about there?" exclaimed the informer. 
" Is it going to pick yourself out o' the glass you are for a 
prisoner? Behind the picktur is the place, you fool! " 

" Never fear, Miss !" whispered Norry, who had just 
before slipped into the apartment, " that'll bother 'em. 
They'll find notheu there, barring pusheen and her kittens, 
for she lias a way of her own up into it". 

A suppressed burst of laughter among tho men con- 



102 THE AYLMERS OF BALLY- AYLMEB. 

firmed the truth of this anticipation ; and the hissings, 
spittings, and growlings of the indignant occupier of the 
recess, as she placed herself in front of her squeaking 
brood, seemed to increase their merriment. The ma- 
gistrate, however, quickly restored order. 

" Hush ! hush ! come along, lad3. Linehan, the place 
u there sure enough, and your hint was a good one : but 
Richard Hasset's name to a warrant for such a prisoner as 
this, would scarcely look well in the county calendar". 

The discomfited wit made no reply, and the party left 
the room. As soon as she heard the door close after 
them, the daughter sunk exhausted into the chair beside 
which she had been standing, and gave vent to her 
excited feelings in bursts of mingled tears and laughter, 
while her hands clasped, and raised, all trembling as they 
were, to Heaven, gave all the evidence she could then 
furnish of her deep and burning gratitude. 

Both mistress and attendant then returned to the 
parlour, where they were soon after rejoined by Mr. 
Hasset and his downcast secretary, the soldiers this time 
remaining without. It is needless to say their search had 
been unsuccessful. After apologizing for the uneasiness 
which he had given her in the performance of an un- 
avoidable duty, etc., the former gentleman took his leave, 
and was followed by the clerk. 

" I wonder what is it that thief o' the world, Linehan, 
is whisperen in ould Hasset's ear", said Norry, as she 
watched the party pacing slowly down the lawn, 

"Are they returning hither?" 

"They wor thinkeu of it, I'm thinken, but to change 
their mind they did". 

After having watched them fairly out of sight, the 
victorious pair proceeded to release their captive. He had 
sufficiently recovered from the stunning effects of the first 
announcement of his danger, to be now fully aware of its 
extent, and he descended from his lurking-place, the most 



THE AYLMERS OF BALLY-ATLMEB. 108 

perfect picture of guilt and horror that a stricken con- 
science ever made. Norry was extending one arm to 
support him, and with the other whisking the dust and 
mortar from his coat, when a deep and rapid inspiration of 
the young lady near her startled them both. The prin- 
ciple of life had been strained to so extreme a degree of 
excitement by the varying emotions of the last hour, that 
it was proportionably depressed on the restoration of 
security. The sight of her father, safely protected through 
the imminent perils which had during that time sur- 
rounded him, effected more than the immediate presence of 
those dangers themselves. In the effort which she made 
to cast herself into her father's arms, her powers suddenly 
failed her, and she sunk at his feet in an access of syncope. 

The old man raised her from the ground, and sup- 
ported her across his breast, while tears of grateful 
affection fell down in rapid showers upon her neck and 
bosom. The attendant, while she supplied the necessary 
means for the revival of her mistress, did not refuse her 
sympathy to the sufferings of the aged parent. 

At that moment the door opened, and Mr. Secretary 
Linehan reentered. 

"I beg pardon, but I dropped a handkitcher some- 
where, 0, murder! what's this, intirely?" as his eye 

fell on the group. 

All were too completely absorbed in another matter to 
observe the intruder. Taking a speedy advantage of this 
circumstance, the honest limb of justice approached the 
window, and beckoned to some persons without. In a few 
minutes afterwards, and while he yet stood concealed in 
the dark corner into which he had slunk, the whole party 
were present at his side. Norry, hearing the clatter if 
footsters, looked over her shoulder, shrieked, started to her 
feet, and dropping the stiff and clenched hand of her young 
lady, began clapping her own, and repeating her doleful 
cries in all the frenzy of Irish despair. The father turned 



104 THE AYLMERS OF BALLY- AYLMEB. 

his wildered eyes on the strangers, and resigning his 
daughter to the arms of her attendant — 

" My child does not hear me", he said in a faint and 
mournful accent, " but give her my blessings when she 
wakes, and bid her pray for me. God bless you all! 

One moment, sir ". As he spoke, he pressed his 

lips to the cold and marble brow of his still uuconscious 
daughter, and untying the light silk handkerchief from her 
neck, he placed it listlessly in his bosom. Then putting 
himself in the custody of the magistrate, he was conducted 
in silence to the carriage which awaited him at the avenue 
gate. 

Another actor was now added to the scene. William 
Aylmer had joined the party at their return ; but, unwil- 
ling, for many reasons, to encounter the unhappy object 
of their pursuit, he had remained without until after their 
departure, and now entered the room just as Katharine 
began to revive. 

" He is well. Be comforted, Katharine", were all the 
answers which he returned to her first inquiries for her 
parent. She was not, however, so easily to be satisfied. 
She repeated her inquiries with an energy and determina- 
tion of manner which made disguise hopeless. 

" And what do you here ?" she exclaimed, in a deli- 
rium of passion, so soon as she had collected from Norry's 
" O-hones !" and Aylmer's silence, the truth of the event ; 
"you were not with them when they first arrived — he was 
surprised — and you are his betrayer". 

* 4 You do me foul wrong. I endeavoured, perhaps 
against my conscience, to dissuade the officers of justice 
from entering here". 

" Against your conscience !" she smiled with a ghastly 
bitterness on him as she answered. " The conscience of 
an ingrate who could turn against the life of an adopted 
father; a man whose bread he ate, whose fire warmed 
him, whose roof protected him, and whose heart loved 



THE AYLMERS OF BALLY-ii YLMEB. 105 

him for seventeen years ! Justice ! The justice of a law 
that would spill the cold blood of age, to make a peace- 
offering for the forgotten errors of youth ! The law that 
continues to persecute after God has forgiven ! Go, go, 
sir; you have less heart than I thought. Go, satisfy 
your conscience, and be just". 

" If my words must fiot be credited", said Aylmer, " I 
have only to endure and to be silent". 

"Answer one question. Have you not linked your 
name with those of his accusers ? Are you not numbered 
on their list ?" 

Aylmer was silent. 

" You have pledged yourself to take the old man's life ! 
Aylmer, do not say so. Think where you passed your 
childhood. Look around you, and upon those scenes 
where you first learned to enjoy life yourself. Will you 
make them desolate ? Oh ! believe me, Aylmer, it is sel- 
dom, very seldom, that it is in the power of human judg- 
ment to decide between the right and the wrong in cases 
so doubtful as this. The law of man that cries for 'blood' 
to the last, may yet be wrong : laws as fierce and cruel 
have been, and are no more in existence : and a more 
merciful race of men may alter this. The law of God, 
that commands mercy and holy forgiveness, may possibly 
be right. Let your own grateful heart tell you to which 
of these chances you should incline". 

" Katharine " 

" Or let this consideration guide yon. Suppose your- 
self lying to-moiTow on your death-bed, and gathering 
comfort to your soul from the memory of your past actions, 
would you feel happier then in the thought that you had 
forgiven a wrong, and saved your old friend, than if you 
had gratified your irresolute thirst for vengeance, or jus- 
tice, now ?" 

" The Almighty, that sees my heart, sees how clear it 
is from the tainting sin that you impute to it", exclaimed 



106 THE AYLMERS OF BALLT-AYLMER. 

the youth : " but I have swo n to do what is just between 
the accused, his country, and his God. That oath I must 
not break". 

'* May that God, then, be my poor father's help; for his 
Earthly friends have forsaken him. It is enough — Ayl- 
mer, farewell !" She placed her hand in his. " May he 
or she who acts ill in this, find mercy and pardon at the 
throne of grace. I leave you without anger ; for you and 
I, whatever be the issue of this heavy trial, must never 
meet again". 

Before Aylmer could, by act or word, return any 
answer to her farewell, Katharine had glided out of the 
apartment. Wishing, nevertheless, to leave some message 
for her, which might possibly have the effect of vin- 
dicating him in some degree from the charge of wanton 
ingratitude, which she had urged against him, he turned 
towards Norry, who still remained, her back supported 
against the wall, clearing away, with the corner of her 
check apron, the tears that were pouring fast from her red 
and heavy eyes. 

" Norry — " he was about to proceed. 

" Oh ! Go from me, sir !" cried the faithful attendant, 
with a fresh burst of grief; " go from me, you contrairy 
gentleman — I rise out o' you !" 

And throwing her arms aloft, as if to give increased 
force to the expression, the indignant soubrette followed 
her mistress. 

The next day's noon beheld the father and daughter in- 
closed withiu the prison doors of an inconsiderable assize- 
town on the western coast. 

The first month of a mild spring had passed away, 
without inducing any material change in the condition of 
the persons of our history, and the little town above 
alluded to began to put on an appearance of life and 
bustle as the assize-week drew nigh. The generally silent 
and sunshiny streets were now made to echo the frequent 



THE AYLMERS OF BALLY-AY LMER. 



lb? 



tramp of the bespattered and reeking saddle -horse, and 
the lumbering rattle of the car which brought its load of 
corn (stacked until now, the season of scarcity) to the 
store of the small dealer, a sort of Lilliputian merchant, 
who made a new profit by shipping, or rather boating the 
grain to the next trading city. The frouts of the inns 
and shebeens were screwed up, and the rooms made ready 
for the temporary convenience of petty jurors, summoned 
from the furthermost limits of the county ; strong farmers 
anxiously looking for the success of their road present- 
ments ; Palatines seeking compensation for burnt hay- 
ricks and out-houses, fired by the hand of the ubiquitous 
Whiteboy ; rural practitioners demanding the legal grant 
for the support of a dispensary ; middlemen in the com- 
mission of tlie peace, eager to curry favour with the mighty 
sojourners by the number and the importance of their 
committals; gray-coated rustics, who had come up to 
town to stand by a friend and relation, whose black-thorn 
perhaps had been a little too fatal among the neighbours 
at the last fair; country gentlemen willing to show off as 
lords of the scene, and ambitioning a niche on the grand 
jury list ; and last and first and best, young and blooming 
speculators of another order, armed with as many terrors, 
bent up to as fatal a purpose, and with as fair and philo- 
sophical a principle for their motive, as that which governed 
the awful sword-bearers of the law itself. 

The concourse of in comers on this occasion was more 
numerous than usual, a circumstance readily accounted for 
by the singular case which was to be decided during the 
ensuing week. All intercourse with the prisoner was 
interdicted, and even his daughter, in order to retain the 
permission, which had in the first instance been granted 
her, of attending to her father's wants in person, was 
obliged to restiict her own movements to the limits of the 
prison. 

A calm, breathless morning beheld the small fishing- 



^ 



108 THE AYLMERS OF BALLY-AYLMEE. 

tmack in which Aylmcr had taken his passage for the 
town, drop her peak in the small inlet which glided by 
the village of Blennerville, a kind of pigmy outport to 
the larger, or capital town. Nothing could be in more 
perfect accordance with the state of the voyager's mind, 
than the scene which was presented to his eyes when the 
loud call of the boatman e-ummoned him on deck. The 
air, as before mentioned, was perfectly still and breathless, 
and the clear sunless serenity of a spring forenoon rested 
on the landscape. On his left hand lay a flat champaign 
of grayish marl, covered with numbers of sea-birds, who 
were busily angling in the little inequalities of the plain 
for the juniors of the scaly tribe, deserted by the tide in 
its retreat. Between him and the ocean, this marl or sand 
elevated itself into mounds of so considerable an altitude, 
as to leave only an occasional shimmering of the mighty 
sea without visible between their obtunded summits. On 
the right hand the bleak and barren chain of mountains, 
which form the distance of the Killarney scenery on the other 
side, rose suddenly in abrupt masses, to a height which left 
the southern prospect entirely to the imagination, and 
threw an air of softened gloom and solitude around the 
handsome villas, which were scattered over the richly 
wooded and improved country at their base. The faint 
hum of the little town, in the distant inland, the twitter- 
ing of the early swallow, the cry of the red-shank, the oc- 
casional wild scream of the horse-gull, the whistle of the 
curlew, and the soft and plaintive cry of the green plover, 
all heard singly, and at long intervals, formed a fitting ac- 
companiment to the scene, unless when the report of a shore- 
gun, directed by the murderous eye of some fustian-clad 
prowling duck-shooter on the coast, re/erberated like*a 
thunder-peal among the echoes of the mountain, and tilled 
the air with a thousand whirring wings, and cries of ter- 
ror and reproach. Above the little bridge of Blennerville, 
a group of boys stood knee- deep in the stream which 



THE AYLMEES OF BALLY-AYLMER. 109 

flowed from the town, groping for "Jliikes", while their 
occasional exclamations of success or disappointment, 
sounded as distinctly in Avlmer's ear as if they had been 
ottered by his side. Toward the offing of the little inlet, 
the drooping sails of the sloops and cutters, the sluggish 
heaving of the bulky ocean, and the jeering of the wits 
and master-spirits of the different crews, as they sat dan- 
gling their legs over the sides of their vessels, formed no 
unworthy balance to the inland portion of the picture. 

" The two tin-pinnies, ye'r honour ?" said the boatman, 
touching his hat, as Ay liner, with the privileged abstrac- 
tion of melancholy, was turning off in the direction of the 
town, forgetful of his fare. Having rectified his error en- 
tirely to the satisfaction of the other party, he pursued his 
way to the town, which lay about a mile distant. 

The flourishing of trumpets and the trampling of many 
feet, announced to him as he entered the suburbs of the 
place, that the judges were already on their way to the 
court. As he hurried along the crowded street, ob- 
structed in his career by persons as eagerly bent to accom- 
plish the same end as himself, he fell in with a scene 
which presented as singular a contrast to that which ho 
had just been admiring, as his imagination could possibly 
have anticipated. The rushing of the anxious multitude 
in various directions, the rattling of outside jaunting-cars, 
empty turf-kishes, and grand jury men's decayed and mud 
covered carnages, the clattering of brogues and horse- 
hoofs, the shouting of one party at the release of a clans- 
man from the clutches of the law, the shrieking and 
cursing of another group, who saw in the drooping head 
and manacled hands of an equally valued kinsman the 
fearful announcement of a contrary judgment, the war- 
whoop of a drunken faction-leader, as he made an effort to 
caper in the air and wheel his seasoned black-thorn above 
his head, the yelping of dogs, the squalling of children, 
the shrill remonstrances of shrewish mothers, the jet 



110 THE AYLMERS OF BALLY- AYLMEB. 

more hideous tones of a steam-engine ballad-singer, whose 
awful lnngs, victorious over the frantic uproar about him, 
made most distinctly audible the burden of a song on the 
woes of the then existing colonial war : 

" And they powering down their chain bulls for to sweep our min 
away, 
O wasn't that a could riciption in the North of Amerieay ?" 

alternated now and then, in compliment to the naval 
port : on of his auditory, to the more popular doggrel of, 

" A sailor courted a farmer's daatur, 
Who lived convanient to the Isle of Man". 

These, superadded to the ordinary bustle of the town, 
formed a combination of sounds that would, had he been 
present, have qualified Old Morose for Hoxton ; and 
would have sounded strangely in the ears of an election 
assessor, a common councilman, au M. P., or a writer of 
overtures. 

It was past noon when Aylmer, after bustling his way 
through the narrow purlieus of the place, found himself 
placed in the centre of a small, low-roofed, ill-lighted, 
dingy court, on one side the bench, from which at that 
moment the final sentence of the law was issuing ; on the 
other the dock, over the bar of which leaned two or three 
squalid looking, pale-faced creatures, listening with a stare 
of wildered abstraction to the announcement of their fate. 
The benches at either side were covered with counsel in 
blue frock-coats and coloured handkerchiefs, the usual 
forensic insignia being treated with philosophical in- 
difference on a provincial circuit. In a small gallery at 
one end Aylmer witnessed an infraction of the inviolable 
rules of Irish female decorum, the presence of a woman 
among the audience of a court of justice. She seemed 
sensible herself of the singularity of her position, for her 
face and person were completely enveloped in a hood and 



THE AYLMERS OF BALLY-AYLMEB. Ill 

cloak, and the place she occupied was the most un- 
obtrusive that could have been selected. 

" So the bills have been found against Cahil Fitz- 
maurice ?" said a voice at Aylmer's side. 

"Aye, have they, then", was the reply, "and it's 
the next on the list. It's a droll* story : they say Coun- 
sellor has instrnctions to call up young Aylmer, in re- 
gard of a ghost appearing to him, and telling him the 
whole tote, by which token he drew the confession out of 
the old man next morning. It was a qnare thing. They 
say young Aylmer thrun holy-water on the sperit, but it 
did not mind that no more than the devil would a parson, 
until he threatened it with the sacrament, when it flew up 
through the roof in a sheet of flame as big as a bonefire 
of a St. John's Eve". 

A whisper now passed from the clerk of the crown to 
the jtrige, and was subsequently transmitted to the turn- 
key, who bowed and put himself in motion. The little 
grating at the far end of the dock was thrown open, and 
the rush which took place in the court showed that all pre- 
sent anticipated the meaning of the order. Heads were 
thrust out, and eyes strained from their sockets to catch 
the first glimpse of the aged prisoner. 

The slow and uncertain footstep at length sounded on 
the boarded ascent leading from the prison, and the form 
of the accused emerging from the gloom of the outer dock, 
was in a short time presented to the gaze of the multitude. 
The old man bowed as he took his place, and passing his 
hand once or twice over his eyes to relieve them from the 
influence of the strong light which fell immediately around 
him, he remained passively awaiting his fate. Although 
he had been prepared to expect a considerable change in 
the appearance of his old guardian, Aylmer experienced a 
shock when he first looked upon his face and person, which 
contributed very materially to shake his conviction of the 

# Extraordinary. 



112 THE AYLMERS OF BALLY AYLMER. 

fairness or the justice of the course which he was himself 
pursuing. The pale and emaciated countenance of the 
prisoner, the thin, wrinkled cheeks, deeply indented temples, 
eyes full of a morbid, sepulchral light, dry, staring hair, 
wasted fingers, and short hectic cough, seemed to intimate, 
that it was of little consequence to him, so far as life 
was concerned, in what way the trial terminated. His 
intellect, too, appeared to have suffered from the ravages 
which disease had made on his frame and constitution. 
It was some moments before his attention could be suffi- 
ciently aroused to enable him to give utterance to the 
plea of "not guilty!" and attend to the opening state- 
ment of the king's counsel. 

In Ireland, where, from a certain train of causes (the 
origin of which we leave to weightier judgments to deter- 
mine), it has been found necessary to appeal more to 
the cowardice than the generosity of human nature, and 
where the even-handed goddess, Justice, has been too 
often accustomed to strike up her balance with her sword 
— in this strange country, people are not surprised to 
hear what is meant to be the opening statement of the 
facts of a criminal case, made the vehicle of cruel, unrea- 
soning, and inhuman invective against the accused. What- 
ever be the evidence in reserve against him, be it so heavy 
and damning as to make any previous wordy accusation 
needless and brutal, or be it so light as to leave the wild 
and empty whirl of blackening assertions poured from 
the crown lawyer's lip unauthorized and libelous, still 
the malicious prosecutor has carried his point — he hears 
his victim, whether innocent or guilty, branded with all 
the diabolical epithets that a flowery vein of fancy, aided 
by a tolerable acquaintance with the poets, can suggest. 
The whole range of imaginative and real history is ex- 
hausted in search of monsters to serve for his parallel, and 
every sly and subtle art by which the personal feelings 
and prejudices of his judges can be enlisted against the 



THE AYLMLRS OF BALLY-AYLMER. 113 

nnhappy culprit is relentlessly put in execution. When 
we look at this fatal engine, which the law allows only to 
the accusing party, and consider that it is most frequently 
directed against some poor wretch who is not even 
acquainted with the language in which he is thus traduced 
in his own hearing, and consequently cannot avail himself 
of his privilege (! !) of reply, «e may, perhaps, perceive 
why it is that persons once placed in the dock make their 
exit more frequently through the back than the front 
entrance, why ropemakers thrive at a certain season, why 
the hangman can endow his daughter so handsomely, and 
why the science of anatomy is so attainable and so 
practically underslood in Ireland. 

On this occasion, however, there was some degree of 
tenderness observed, and the detail of the case was 
straight forward, simple, and impartial. After going 
through the greater portion of the evidence which he had 
in reserve, the counsel was observed to pause as he came 
to that part of his brief which contained the deposition of 
William Aylmer. It was a difficult subject, and one 
which, if he had had a less credulous audience to deal 
with, the learned gentleman might have hesitated yet 
more about introducing. The deep silence, however, — the 
hush which his own pause occasioned among his auditory, 
showed him that they anticipated the tale (which was, 
indeed, already iu circulation, with various embellishments 
similar to that overheard by Aylmer in the court), and 
that he would at lea t have to tell the story to grave and 
attentive ears. He was now coming, he said, to a 
portion of the evidence which would, perhaps, require a 
severer exercise of their judgments than any which had 
been hitherto submitted to their consideration. He 
believed — he knew, that he was addressing himself to 
Christian hearers, to men convinced as he was himself of 
the divine origin of those sacred records which told of the 
last warning of the buried Samuel, the supernatural re- 



114 THE AYLMERS OF BALLY-AYLMEB. 

vealment of the murder of Uriah, and a thousand oth« 
interpositions of the Almighty Being, setting aside, or 
suspending, for some immediate end, the ordinary pro- 
cesses of nature. Justice, he remarked, was the same 
uow as in those days — it was the same God who watched 
over the actions of all generations, and although the 
completion of the divine code, left perfect by the Founder 
of the Christian religion, rendered those miraculous in- 
terventions less needful for the interests of mankind than 
ihey were while revelation was yet partial and defective, 
still there was no ground on which a man could be 
justified in declaring such occurrences out of the pale 
of things possible. He admitted that nothing short of 
evidence amounting almost to ocular demonstration — a 
wonderful corroboration in circumstances — and, in short, 
all the most powerful incentives to belief which could be 
adduced — would be sufficient to persuade them to do so 
much violence to their common experience ; but he trusted 
he should be enabled to bring all the corroborative 
testimony, which they could deem necessary, before 
them in the course of the evening. 

With this preamble, the learned counsel proceeded to a 
detail of the deposition made by Aylmer; after which, 
the examination of witnesses commenced. The listless 
woman of the mountain, Vauria, was one of the first who 
were called ; but her testimony went no further than to 
the quarrel of the friends, its termination, and a sub- 
sequent muttered threat on the part of the prisoner, as he 
followed the deceased up from the cabin. She admitted, 
too, on her cross-examination, that she was instigated to 
come forward now, after a long interval of silence, by the 
desire of her kinsman, who had been imprisoned on the 
information of young Aylmer, for plundering the prisoner's 
sheep-walk. 

Night had fallen before the case for the prosecution 
closed. Numbers of the spectators, exhausted by the 



THE AYLMERS OF BALLY- AYLMER. 115 

length of the trial, had dropped off one after another, 
leaving the audience now comparatively thin and meagre. 
The voices of the counsel sounded more loudly, owing to 
the emptiness of the adjacent hall and the silence of the 
streets, while the dull, heavy light cast by the few tallow 
candles which were placed in sconces against the walls 
and about the bench, added considerably to the com- 
fortless solemnity of the scene. 

At length young Aylmer was called on to give his 
evidence. A heavy moan from the prisoner, almost the 
first audible sound which had broken from his lips during 
the day, struck on the ear and on the heart of the youth, 
as he ascended the steps leading to the witness-table. It 
was too late, however, for pause or wavering. He 
mustered his spirits, and bent up his soul to the duty 
which he had to discharge. 

At the moment he took the book in his hand, and pro- 
ceeded to repeat the form of oath, a low, broken scream 
of anguish, long suppressed, and now in its effort to 
relieve itself seeming to rend the heart from which it 
proceeded, rang through the building, and immediately 
after, a well-known, though strangely altered voice, from 
the now silent and nearly deserted gallery, exclaimed in a 
tone of piteous entreaty: 

"Aylmer! Aylmer! Aylmer! mercy! for the sake 
of old times, mercy ! Do not swear away the old man's 
life!" 

The sensation which this singular appeal produced in 
the court may be easily imagined. The softness and 
tenderness of the tones brought tears into the eyes of 
many of the hearers, and it was even with some dif- 
ficulty that the judge could compel his features into an 
expression of high indignation. 

" Remove that person, Mr. Sheriff", he said, quietly. 
" I know it, sir, and can make allowance for it", he con- 
tinued, in answer to a whisper from one of the prisoner's 



118 THE AYLMERS OF BALLY-AYLMEIt. 

counsel, "bnt it is exceedingly indecorous. It should not 
have been permitted". 

Order was again restored, and the witness, mastering, 
by a violent effort, the convulsions of passion by which his 
frame was shaken to the centre, proceeded to make his 
deposition. He went through all the circumstances ot 
his testimony with a plainness and feeling which won 
irresistibly upon the sympathies of his audience, and 
impressed even the most incredulous with the conviction, 
that, however deluded his senses might have been, the 
youth was saying only that which in his heart he 
believed to be true. The chief ground, however, upon 
which the counsel for the crown rested his claim on the 
credence of the jury, was the corroboration which the 
prisoner's conduct, on the next morning, afforded to the 
supernatural revelation of the night preceding. The im- 
pression left on the minds of those w ho sat in the box was 
striking and perceptible. 

As Aylmcr concluded his evidence, and prepared to 
descend, a low whisper, addressed to the ear of the 
prisoner's leading counsel, caught his ear. 

" Must it be, sir ?" 

" It must. We have no other chance, and it is 
as well first as last", was the reply, also conveyed in 
a whisper. 

Aylmer, imagining that he recognized the voice of the 
querist, turned quickly round, but saw no face that he 
knew. The counsel was already engaged in earnest con- 
versation with a learned brother. 

The case for the prosecution having terminated with the 
evidence of William Aylmer, the gentleman who was 
engaged on the other side was about to rise and proceed 
with the defence, when he was interrupted by the court: — 

"They had already", his lordship observed, "prolonged 
the hearing of the case far into the night, and many 
hours beyond the customary period of rising. He was 



THE AYLMERS OF BALLY-AYLMER. 117 

far, however, from wishing either to cut short, or post- 
pone the termination of the case, and he would suffer it 
to proceed until the whole of the testimony had been laid 
before the jury, if the counsel on either side desired it. 
But it appeared to him that a more direct course might be 
used, in order to arrive at a satisfactory decision. The 
doubt which remained on his own mind, was so strong 
as to induce him to hesitate a moment on the propriety 
of sending the case to the jury, such as it was at that 
moment. The evidence was of so peculiar a character, 
that it required an exertion of reason, almost " beyond 
the reaches" of that faculty in man, to form a con- 
scientious judgment upon it. He admitted the force of 
the learned counsel's argument, in his statement of the 
case : he could not, no believer in Christianity could, deny 
the possibility of such supernatural appearances ; but there 
was one short mode of deciding the question, as to the 
reality of that which was here deposed to with so much 
apparent sincerity. The only ground on which the jury 
could reconcile to their own consciences the possibility of 
the tale, was the necessity of such an intervention, the 
dignus vindice nodus, for the ends of justice. "Let then", 
his lordship continued, elevating his voice to a pitch of 
sonorous gravity, " let the ghost of the murdered man (if 
murdered) come forward, and tell his tale here in this 
court, where his presence is much more necessary than in 
the chamber of a single individual. — Crier, repeat the 
form !" 

A murmur of amazement ran through the court at this 
extraordinary speech, and immediately after a silence 
ensued, as breathless, anxious, and profound, as if the 
spectators really imagined they were about to witness a 
miracle. The crier twice went through the form, and 
twice the call died away unheeded among the echoes of 
the deserted halls. Aylmer, anxious to observe its effect 
on the prisoner, turned round to gaze upon him, when a 



118 THE AYLMERS OF BALLY- AYLMER. 

startling change which took place in the whole appearance 
of the man, riveted and fixed his eyes in the direction 
they had taken. Fitzmaurice was elevating his head 
from the stooping posture which he had maintained 
during the period of the last witness's examination, and 
casting a wild and wavering glance around him, when 
those who, like Aylmer, had their eyes fixed on his, ob- 
served them to settle in a stare of frozen horror upon a 
certain point. His lip grew white, quivered, and then 
was still as marble — his hair stirred and separated— his 
brow and cheek became yet more damp and death like 
than before — a slight shivering passed over his frame, and 
then every member set and stiffened in a statue-like 
repose. There was no start — no sudden change of 
attitude ; there was merely an interruption of the action 
of the frame, as if some fearful shock had penetrated at 
once to the principle of life, and left the will and the 
power of motion paralyzed and helpless ; with a sud- 
denness similar to that of a cataleptic attack, in which the 
patient seems to have 

" forgot himself to stone"* 

before any external change is visible. The eyes only of 
the prisoner moved, following a certain object along the 
entrance of the court and to the witness-table. Aylmer, 
terrified by the action of the criminal, looked in the same 
direction. An old white-haired man was in the act of 
ascending the steps. Aylmer felt as if a bolt of ice had 
been struck into his heart, when he recognized in the 
equivocal and lurid candlelight, the features of his mid- 
night visitor; while the gray frieze-coat and heavy 
sounding tread of the figure, brought to his recollection 
the strange letter-bearer of the Kerry mountains ! 

" You see before you, my lord", said the stranger, ** an 
unfortunate man, who has only within a few months re- 
turned to his native country, and has during that time 



THE AYLMERS OF BALLY-AYLMEB, 119 

been wandering like a thief about the precincts of his own 
estate, in fear of a legal visitation on a charge of many 
years' standing. I am weary of a life of anxiety and 
concealment, and even if I were not called upon by the 
tongue of justice herself to come forward now, I would, 
before long, have gladly delivered myself up to the laws 
of my country". 

" Your lordship will observe", quickly remarked the 
counsel for the prisoner, "that this gentleman, Mr. 
Robert Aylmer of Bally- Aylmer, does not make any con- 
fession or admission whatsoever of the truth of the charge 
to which he alludes ; he merely comes forward to meet 
inquiry, and redeem his forfeited place in society". 

His lordship smiled as he nodded an acquiescence, and 
Mr. Aylmer smiled too, but in a more melancholy sort. 

"Gentlemen", said the judge, addressing the jury, "I 
am glad to inform you that your business is over for this 
night. You will find a verdict of acquittal and attend to- 
morrow". 

" This beats the witch of Endor hollow", said the 
crown lawyer, as he threw his brief to the solicitor; 
" your lordship may take place among the cabalists of 
Domdaniel nfter this". 

Several other equally admirable witticisms passed 
among the junior counsel on the back benches; such as 
that his lordship was a clever resurrection-man — that he 
had given a grave turn to the proceedings — that it was a 
dead-letter affair, with various inflictions of a similar 
nature, which we grieve to say our slippery memory will 
not enable us to lay before the reader. 

No person had yet sufficiently abstracted their attention 
from the now engrossing point of interest, the resuscitated 
lord of Bally-Aylmer, to bestow a thought on the prisoner. 
It was with a general exclamation of surprise, therefore, 
that they perceived, when the court commanded his im- 
mediate discharge, that his pla*e at the bar was empty 



120 THE ATLMERS OF BALLY- AYLMER. 

The turnkey, all confusion at this unaccountable dis« 
appearance, seized a candle and examined the dock, when 
the unhappy man was found stretched on the floor, which 
was flooded with blood around his head. He was raided 
gently, and conveyed, while yet iu a senseless state, to his 
bed-chamber in the adjoining prison ; Sandy Culhane, by 
the direction of Mr. Aylmer, lending his assistance to the 
officers of the place. 

The court immediately after became astir with the bustle 
of separation, and many a wondering hearer went borne to 
astonish the ears of his fire-side circle with a red-hot 
narrative of the night's adventures, whl h have since been 
transmitted, with sundry decorations and gratuitous in- 
cidents superadded, to their children's children. 

The two Aylmers, thus strangely restored to each other, 
proceeded together to a hotel, where the remainder of the 
night was spent in mutual inquiries and explanations, with 
an entire detail of which we shall not trouble the reader. 
The old man would, he said, have prevented all necessity 
for an investigation before it commenced, had he been 
aware of the circumstances that had taken place ; but a 
communication from the Flushing contrabandist, who had 
saved his life on the night of the quarrel with Fits- 
maurice, and who was then sojourning at Waterford, had 
called him suddenly away, the morning after he had 
visited Aylmer at Kilavariga. He had been induced to 
take this step by the information given him by Sandy 
Culhane, that a marriage was contemplated by Fitzmauriee 
between Aylmer and his daughter; a circumstance con- 
firmed in some degree by the extraordinary care which ho 
observed had been taken of the Aylmer property. This 
arrangement was not only impleading to him in itself, but 
doubly so from its interference with a long and anxiously 
cherished design of his own, with respect to the fasci- 
nating and accomplished daughter of his foreign friend, 
Miss Quisana Van Huggel Schneiderdrugger. 

"I perceive", Mr. Aylmer continued, as a slight flush 



THE ATLMERS OF BALLT-AYLMER. 121 

passed over the brow and cheek of his son, at the 
allusion to Katharine Fitzmaurice, " I see that I was 
wrong in my calculation, and so there is an end of the 
scheme at once. Totally ignorant as I was of my son's 
character and disposition, and rather induced to believe, 
from liis intinate connection with the family of Kilavariga, 
that I should at least have wounded feelings and severed 
and bleeding affections to contend with, it is hardly 
surprising that I should have preferred making a confidant 
of the ancient and faithful servant of our house, im- 
mediately on my arrival. All occasion for secrecy is no.v, 
however, done away with, as my old friend Evans of 
Evanstown informs me that I have nothing farther to 
apprehend from the possibility of evidence being yet 
found to establish the charge once in existence against me". 

The old man was correct in his anticipations on this 
head. The next morning he placed himself voluntarily 
under arrest, and was presently after discharged in con- 
sequence of the non-appearance of the prosecutors. 

The shock which Fitzmaurice had received was not so 
immediately fatal as might have been expected. Hs 
lived long enough to be reestablished in peace and good 
neighbourhood with the friend of his youth, and to join 
the hands of his daughter and her lover in the holy clasp 
of authorized affection. 

" Well, Mick", said Culhane, addressing the aged 
herdsman, as the wedding party passed near them in their 
return, " there's the thief with the brogues and pavers, 
that you traced from Kilavariga the night of the great 
snow. Which o' the three now do you think will dance 
the best moneen at the hauling home ?" 

"The master thin, agen the world! Ah ! the times for 
grinding and footing are gone by, but the Avlmers were 
always great hands at the feet, and av there's a relic of 
ould times in the country, it will be shown that night at 
Bally-Avlmer". 

5 



THE HAND km WORD. 



Porque ninguno 

De mi venganza tome 
Vengarme de mi procure 
Buscando desde esa torre 
En el ancho mar sepulchre. 

Calde run's El mayor Movftruo lot 7*lm 

Vengeance is here the right of none — 
My punishment be mine al«ne ! 
In the broad waves that heave and boom 
Beneath this tower I seek my tomb. 



TnE village of Kilkee, on the south - western coast of 
Ireland, has been for many years to the city of Limerick 
(on a small scale) that which Brighton is to London. At 
the time, however, when the events which form the sub- 
ject of the following little history took place, it had not 
yet begun to take precedence of a watering-place some- 
what farther to the north on the same coast, called 
Miltown Malbay, which had been for a long time, and 
still was, a favourite summer resort with the fashionables 
of the county, such as they were. The village itself con- 
sists merely of six or eight streets, or straggling rows of 
houses, scattered irregularly enough over those waste 
banks of sand in which the land terminates as it ap- 
proaches the Atlantic. 

Those banks, or sandhills, as they are called, do not in 
this place slope gradually to the marge of the sea, but 



THE HAND AND WORD. 123 

form a kind of abrupt barrier or natural terrace around 
the little bay, descending with such suddenness that the 
ledges on the extreme verge completely overhang the 
water, and with their snow-white fronts and neat green 
lattices, produce a sufficiently picturesque effect when the 
tide is at the fall. 

The little inlet which has been dignified with the title 
of a bay, opens to the north-west by a narrow mouth, 
rendered yet narrower in appearance by the Duggara 
rocks, which stretch more than half-way across from the 
southern extremity. A bed of fine hard sand reaches as 
far as low-water mark, and when the retiring waves have 
left it visible, affords a pleasant promenade to the bathers. 
Winding on either side towards the opening of the bay 
and along the line of coast, are seen a number of broken 
cliffs, which, rising to a considerable height, form to the 
north a precipitous headland called Corballagh, and to the 
southward they stretch away behind Duggara in a thou- 
sand fantastic shapes. Close to the mouth or opening, on 
this side, is the Amphitheatre, which has been so named 
in later years, from the resemblance which instantly 
suggests itself to the beholder. Here the rocks lift 
themselves above the level of the sea in regular grades, 
bearing a kind of rude similitude to the benches of such 
a theatre as that above-named, to the height of two or 
three hundred feet. In the bathing season this place is 
seldom without a few groups or straggling figures, being 
turned to account in a great many different ways, whether 
as a resting-place to the wanderers on the cliffs, or a point 
of rendezvous to the numerous pic-nic parties who come 
here to enjoy a dinner al fresco, and luxuriate on the 
grand and boundless ocean-prospect which lies beneath 
and beyond them. 

A waggish host of the village with whom I had the 
honour to domiciliate during a brief sojourn in the place a 
few years since, informed me that a number of serious 



124 THE HAND AND WORD. 

accidents had rendered the visitors to the Amphitheatre 
somewhat more cautious of suffering themselves to become 
entangled among the perils of the shelving and dis- 
jointed crags of which it was composed. Among many 
anecdotes of warning he mentioned one which occurred to 
a meditative guest of his own, for which I at first gave 
him credit for a poetical imagination, though I afterwards 
found he had spoken nothing more than a real fact. 

"To take out his book" (he said in answer to a 
question from me, as to the manner of the occurrence), 
" and to sit down as it might be this way on a shelving 
rock, and the sea to be roaring, and he to be thinking of 
nothing, only what he was reading, when a swell riz and 
took him out a distins, as it might be to give him a good 
sea- view of the cliffs and the place, and turning again 
the same way it came, laid him up on the same stone, 
where, I'll be your bail, he was mighty scarce in less than 
no time". 

Beyo:id the Amphitheatre, the cliff rise3 to a still 
greater height, forming an eminence called the Look-out. 
Shocking as the tale may appear to modern reader^ it 
has been asserted, and but too many evidences remain to 
give weight and colour to the supposition, that in those 
barbarous (though not very distant) times, this place was 
employed as an observatory by the wild fishermen of the 
coast and neighbouring hamlets, the principal portion of 
whose livelihood was derived from the plunder of the un- 
fortunate men who happened to be wrecked on this 
inhospitable shore ; and it is even recorded, and generally 
believed, that fires were, on tempestuous nights, frequently 
lighted here, and in other dangerous parts of the coast, in 
order to allure the labouring vessel, already hardly set by 
the war of winds and waves, to a more certain and- im- 
mediate destruction on the rocks and shoals beneath, a 
practice, it is said, which was often successful to a fearful 
extent. 



TIIE HAND AND WORD. 125 

The most remarkable point of scenery about tbe place. 
and one with which we shall close our perhaps not un- 
needful sketch of the little district, is the Puffing-hole, a 
cavern near the base of the cliff last-mentioned, which 
vaults the enormous mass of crag to a considerable 
distance inland, where it has a narrow opening, appearing 
to the eyes of a stranger like a deep natural well. When 
the tremendous sea from abroad rolls into this* cavern, the 
effect is precisely the same as if water were forced into an 
inverted funnel, its impetus of course increasing as it 
ascends through the narrow neck, until at length reaching 
the perpendicular opening, or Puffing-hole, it jets fre- 
quently to an immense height into the air, and falls in 
rain on the mossy fields behind. 

At a little distance from this singular phenomenon 
stood a rude cottage. It was tenanted by an aged woman 
of the place, the relict of one of the most daring plun- 
derers of the coast, who was suspected to have been 
murdered by one of his own comrades a good many years 
before. The interior of the little building bore sufficient 
testimony to the unlawful habits of its former master. 
All, even the greater proportion of the domestic utensils, 
were formed of ship timbers: a rudder had been 
awkwardly hacked and hewed up into something bearing 
a resemblance to a table, which stood in the middle of the 
principal apartment ; the rafters were made from the spars 
of boom, peek, and yard; a settle bed at the further end 
had been constructed from the rains of a gallant ship ; 
and the little boarded parlour inside was furnished in part 
from the same materials. A number of planks, care- 
lessly fastened together by way of a dresser, stood against 
the wall, shining forth in all the glory of burnished 
pewter, wooden-platter, and gaudily painted earthenware 
the heir-looms of the house of Moiun. 

Terrified and shocked to the soul by the sudden fate 
of her late spouse, Mrs. Moran, the proprietress of the 



120 THE HAND AND WORD. 

cottage, resolved that their boy, an only child, should not 
follow the dangerous courses of his father. In this she 
happened to be seconded by the youth's own disposition, 
which inclined to a quietude and gentleness of character. 
He was, at his sixteenth year, far beyond his compeers of 
the village in point of education, and not behind in 
beauty of person, and dexterity at all the manual ex- 
ercises of goal, single-stick, etc., etc., accomplishments, 
however, which were doomed net to be wasted in the 
obscurity of his native wilderness, for before he had com- 
pleted his seventeenth year, he was laid by the heels, one 
morning as he sat at breakfast, and pressed to sea. 

One day was allowed him to take leave of old friends, 
and prepare to bid a long adieu to his native home. This 
day was a painful one, for more reasons than one. 

Of course it is not to be supposed that so smart, 
handsome, clever, and well disposed a lad as Charlie 
Moran, should be unappreciated among the maidens of the 
district in which he vegetated. He had in short a lover ; 
a fine flaxen-haired girl, with whom he had been intimate 
from infancy up to youth, when the wars (into the service 
of which he suspected he was betrayed by the agency of 
the girl's parent, a comfortable Palatine in the neigh- 
bourhood) called him away from his boyish sports to the 
exercise of a premature manhood. Their parting was by 
no means more agreeable to little Ellen Sparling than to 
himself, seeing that they were more fondly and deeply 
attached to one another, than is frequently the case with 
persons of their age and rank in life, and moreover that 
it would not have been the easiest matter possible to find 
a pair so well matched in temper and habits, as well as in 
personal loveliness fjust then unfolding itself in each 
with a promise of perfect maturity) anywhere about the 
country-side. 

The father of the girl, however, who, to say the truth, 
was indeed the contriver of Moran's impressment, looked 



THE HAND AND WORD. 127 

forward to his absence with a great deal of joy. The old 
Palatine, who possessed all the prudence of parents in 
every soil and season, and all the natural obstinacy of 
disposition inherent in the national character of the land 
of his forefathers, had on this occasion his prejudices 
doubly strengthened, and rendered at last inveterate, by 
the differences of religion and education, as well as by 
that eternal, reciprocal, and indomitable hatred which in- 
variably divides the usurping and favoured immigrant from 
the oppressed indigenous disinherited inheritor of the soil. 
Fond of his little girl, yet hating her friend, he took the 
part of weaning them asunder by long absence, a common 
mistake among more enlightened parents than Mr. 
Sparling. 

On the day preceding that of young Moran's departure, 
when the weeping girl was hanging on his neck, and over- 
whelming him with conjurations to " prove true", an 
advice, to follow which, he assured her over and over 
again in his own way, he needed no exhortations, her 
lover proposed to her to walk (as it might be for the last 
time) towards a spot which had been the usual limit to 
their rambles, and their general rendezvous whenever her 
father thought proper to forbid their communing in his 
house, which was only done at intervals, his vigilance 
being a sort of chronic affection, sometimes rising to a 
height which seemed dangerous to their hopes, sometimes 
relapsing into a state of almost perfect indifference. To 
this spot the lovers now repaired. 

It was a recess in the cliff that beetled over the 
caverns, and was so formed as to hold no more than three 
or four persons, who, when they occupied the rude seats 
naturally furmed in the rock, were invisible to any human 
eye which might be directed otherwhere than from the sea. 
The approach to it was by a narrow footway, in ascending 
or descending which, one seemed almost to hang in air, so 
far did the cliff-head project over the waters, and so scanty 



128 THE HAND AND WORD. 

was the path of the descent on either side. Custom, 
however, had rendered it a secure footing to the in- 
habitants of the village, and the lovers speedily found 
themselves within the little nook, secluded from every 
mortal eye. 

It was a still autumn evening: there was no sunshine, 
but the fixed splendour of the sky above and around 
them, on which the lines, or rather waves, of frhin vapour 
extending from the north-west, and tinged on one side by 
the red light of the sun, which had just gone down, pre- 
sented the similitude of a sea frozen into a brilliant mass 
in the act of undulation. Beyond them lay Bishop's 
Island, a little spot of land, shooting up from the waves 
in the form of a gigantic column, about three hundred 
feet in height, the sides barren and perpendicular, and the 
plain above covered with verdure to the marge itself. 
Immediately above their heads was a blighted elder tree 
(one of the most remarkable phenomena* of this woodless 
district) which now hung, like a single gray hair, over the 
bare and barren brow of the aged cliff. 

The wanderers sat here in perfect security, although by 
a step forward they might look upon a tremendous in- 
slanting precipice beneath, against the base of which, at 
times, the sea lashed itself with such fury, as to bound in 
huge masses over the very summit, and to make the cliff 
itself shake and tremble to a considerable distance inland. 

" I have asked you to come here, Ellen", said her 
lover, as he held her hand in one of his, while the other 
was passed round hsr waist, "for a very solemn purpose. 
It is a belief amongst us, and many have seen it come to 
pass, that those who pledge themselves to any promise, 
whether of hate or love, and who, with their hands 

• A sufficiently characteristic observation of Cromwell on the 
barrenness of the country inland, is preserved among the peasantry, 
" Tiiere was", he ob-erved, " neither a tree to hang a man, fire to 
burn, nor water to drown him " 



THE HAND AND WORD. 129 

clasped together as ours are now, plight their faith and 
troth to perform that promise to one another— it is our 
belief, I say, that whether in the land of the living or the 
dead, they can never enjoy a quiet soul until that promise 
is made good. I must serve five years before I obtain 
my discharge ; when I get that, Ellen, I will return to 
this place, and let you know, by a token, that I am in the 
neighbourhood. Pledge me your hand and word, that 
when you receive that token, whether you are married or 
unmarried, whether it be dark, moon-light, or stormy, you 
will come out alone to meet me where I shall appoint, on 
the night when I shall send it". 

Without much hesitation the young girl solemnly 
pledged herself to what he required. He then unbound 
from her hair a ribbon by which it was confined, kissed 
it, and placed it in his bosom, after which they ascended 
the cliff and separated. 

After the departure of young Moran, his mother, to 
relieve her loneliness, opened a little place of entertainment 
for the jish -jokers, whose trade it was (and is) to carry the 
fish taken on the coast to the nearest market-town for sale, 
as also for the fishermen of the village and chance pas- 
sengers. By this means she had accumulated a very con- 
siderable sum of money in a few years. Ellen Sparling 
observed this with the more satisfiction, as she felt it 
might remove the greatest bar that had hitherto opposed 
itself to her union with Charles Moran. 

Five years and some months had rolled away since his 
departure, and he had not been heard of during that 
time in his native village. All things remained very 
nearly in the same state in which he had left them, with 
the exception of the increased prosperity of his mother's 
circumstances, and the matured beauty of Ellen, who was 
grown into a blooming woman, the admiration of all the 
men, and it is said, though I don't vouch for the fact, of 
all the wonen too, of her neighbourhood. There are 
6* 



IdO THE HAND AND WORD. 

limits of superiority beyond which envy cannot reach, and 
it might be said, perhaps, that Ellen was placed in this 
position of advantage above all her female acquaintances. 
It is not to be supposed that she was left untempted all 
this while, or at least unsought. On the contrary, a 
number of suitors had directly or indirectly presented 
themselves, with one of whom only, however, I have any 
business at present. 

He was a young fisherman, and one of the most 
constant visitors at the elegant soirees of the widow 
Moran, where, however, he was by no means a very 
welcome guest, either to the good woman or her customers. 
He held, nevertheless, a high place at the board, and 
seemed to exercise a kind of dominion over the revellers, 
perhaps as much the consequence of his outward ap- 
pearance, as of his life and habits. He was powerfully 
made, tall, and of a countenance which, even in his hours 
of comparative calmness and inaction, exhibited in the 
mere arrangement of its features, a brutal violence of 
expression which was exceedingly repugnant. The middle 
portion of his physiognomy was rather flat and sunken, 
and his mouth and forehead projecting much, rendered 
this deformity disgustingly apparent. Deep black, large 
glistening eyes glanced from beneath a pair of brows, 
which so nearly approached each other, as, on every 
movement of passion or impulse of suspicion, to form in 
all appearance one thick shaggy line across, and the 
uuamiable effect of the countenance altogether was not 
improved by the temper of the man, who was feared 
throughout the neighbourhood, as well for his enormous 
strength, as for the violence, the suspicious tetchiness, and 
the habitual gloominess of his character, which was never 
more visible than when, as now, he affected the display of 
jollity and hearty good-fellowship. It wa3 whispered, 
moreover, that he was visited, after some unusual ex- 
citement, with fits of wiidness approaching to insanity, at 



THE HAND AND WORD. 181 

the accession of which he was wont to conceal himself 
from all human intercourse for a period, until the evil 
influence (originating, as it was asserted privately among 
his old associates, in the remorse with which the re- 
collection of his manifold crimes was accompanied) had 
passed away — a circumstance which seemed to augur a 
consciousness of this mental infirmity. At the end of 
those periods of retirement, he was wont to return to his 
companions with a haggard and jaded countenance, a de- 
jected demeanour, and a sense of shame manifested in his 
address, which, for a short space only, served to temper 
the violence of his conduct. Robbers and murderers, as 
all of his associates were, this evil-conditioned man had 
gone so far beyond them in his total recklessness of crime, 
that he had obtained for himself the distinguishing 
appellative (like most nicknames in Irish low life, ironically 
applied) of Yamon Macauntha, or Honest Ned; oc- 
casionally varied (after he had reached the estate of 
manhood, and distinguished himself among the smugglers, 
over whom he acquired a speedy mastery, by his daring 
spirit, and almost invariable success in whatever he under- 
took) with that of Yamon Dhu, or Black Ned, a name 
which applied as well to his dark complexion, long, matted, 
coal-black hair and beard, as to the fierce and relentlets 
energy of his disposition. 

One anecdote, which was told with suppressed breath 
and involuntary shuddering, even among those who were 
by his side in all his deeds of blood, may serve to illustrate 
the terrific and savage cruelty of the man. A Dutch 
vessel had gone to pieces on the rocks beneath the Look- 
out. The waves rolled in like mountains, and lashed 
themselves with such fury against the cliffs, that very 
speedily nearly all those among the crew who clung to the 
drifting fragments of the wreck, were dashed to atoms on 
the projecting granite. A few only, among whom was the 
captain of the vessel, who struggled with desperate 



182 THE HAND AND WORD. 

vigour against the dreadful element, succeeded in securing 
themselves on a projecting rock, from whence, feeble and 
exhausted as they were, the poor mariners endeavoured to 
hail a number of people, who were looking out on the 
wreck from the cliff-head above them. They succeeded in 
attracting attention, and the spectators prepared to lower 
a rope for their relief, which, as they were always pro- 
vided against such accidents, they were not long in 
bringing to pass. It was first girded around the waist of 
the captain, and then fastened around that of his two 
companions, who, on giving a signal, were drawn into the 
air, the former holding in one hand a little casket, and 
with the other defending himself against the pointed pro- 
jections of the cliff as he ascended. When very near the 
summit, which completely overhung the waves, he begged, 
in a faint tone, that some one would tak« the casket from 
his hands, as he feared it might be lost i» the attempt to 
secure his own hold. Yamon was but too alert in 
acceding to the wretched man's request ; he threw him- 
self forward on the sand, with his breast across the rope, 
and took the casket from his uplifted hand. 

" God's blessing on your souls, my delivtrers", cried 
the poor man, wringing his clasped hands, wi.'h a gesture 
and look of fervent gratitude, " the casket is sa. f c. thank 

God! and my faith to my employers '' he was yet 

speaking, when the rope severed under Black Yamon's 
breast, and the three men were precioitated into the 
yawning waters beneath. They were hurried out by the 
retiring waves, and the next moment their mangled 
bodies were left in the recesses of the cliff. 

A cry of horror and of compassion burst even from the 
savage hearts of a crew of smugglers, who had been 
touched by the courage and constancy which was Dis- 
played by the brave unfortunates. Yamon alone remained 
unmoved (and hard must the heart ha*e been which even 
the voice of gratitude, "inmerited though it was. could not 



THE HAND aND WdlD. 33.1 

Boftea or penetrate). He gave utterance to a burst of 
hoarse, grumbling laughter, as he waved the casket in 
triumph before the eyes of his comrades. 

"Huh! huh!" he exclaimed, "she was a muthaun — ■ 
why didn't she keep her casket till she drew her painther 
ashore?" 

One of the men, as if doubting the possibility of the 
inhuman action, advanced to the edge of the cliff. He 
found the rope had been evidently divided by some sharp 
instrument; and observing something glittering where 
Yamon lay, he stooped forward and picked up an open 
clasp-knife, which was presently claimed by the unblushing 
monster. However shocked they might have been at the 
occurrence, it was no difficult matter for Yamon to 
persuade Iris companions that it would be nowise con- 
venient to let the manner of it transpiro in the neigh- 
bourhood ; and in a very few minutes the fate of the 
Dutchmen seemed completely banished from their re- 
collection (never very retentive of benevolent emotions), 
and the only question held regarded the division of the 
booty. They were disappointed, however, in their hopes 
of spoil, for the casket which the faithful shipman was so 
anxious to preserve, and to obtain which his murderer had 
made sacrihee of so many lives, contained nothing more 
than a few papers of bottomry and insurance, valueless to 
all but the owners of the vessel. This circumstance 
seemed to touch the villain more nearly than the wanton 
cruelty of which he had been guilty ; and his gang, who 
were superstitious exactly in proportion to their want of 
honesty and of all moral principle, looked upon it as a 
supernatural occurrence, in which the judgment of an 
offended Deity was made manifest. 

This amiable person had a sufficiently good opinion 0/ 
himself to make one among the adu iters of Ellen 
Sparling. It is scarcely necessary to say that his suit was 
unsuccessful. Indeed the maiden was heard privately tc 



134 THE HAND AND WORD. 

declare her conviction that it was impossible there conld ba 
found anywhere a more ugly and disagreeable man, m 
every sense. 

One fine frosty evening, the widow Moran's was more 
than usually crowded. The fire blazed cheerfully on the 
hearth, so as to render any other light unnecessary, 
although the night had already begun to close in. The 
mistress of the establishment was busily occupied in re- 
plenishing the wooden noggins, or drinking vessels, with 
which the board was covered ; her glossy white hair 
turned up under a clean kerchief, and a general gala 
gladness spreading an unusual light over her shrivelled 
and attenuated features, as by various courtesies, ad- 
dressed to the company around her, she endeavoured to 
make the gracious in her own house. Near the chimney- 
corner sat Dura Keys, a dark featured, bright eyed girl, 
who on account of her skill on the bagpipe, a rather un- 
feminine accomplishment, and a rare one in this district 
(where, however, as in most parts of Ireland, music of 
some kind or another was constantly in high request) 
filled a place of high consideration among the merry* 
makers. The remainder of the scone was filled up with 
the fishermen, smugglers, and fish-jolters ; the latter wrapt 
iu their blue frieze coats, and occupying a more un- 
obtrusive corner of the apartment, while Yamon, as noisy 
and imperious as usual, sat at the head of the rude table, 
giving the word to the whole assembly. 

A knocking was heard at the slight hurdle-door. The 
good woman went to open it, and a young man entered. 
He was well formed, though rather thin and dark skinned, 
and a profusion of black curled hair clustered about his 
temples, corresponding finely with his glancing, dark, 
fiery eye. An air of sadness, or of pensiveness, too, hung 
about him, which gave an additional interest to his ap- 
pearance, and impressed the spectator with an involuntary 
respect. Mrs. Moran drew back with one of her lowest 



THE HAND AND WORD. 133 

curtsies. The stranger smiled sadly, and extended hig 
hand. " Don't you know me, mother ?" he asked. The 
poor woman sprung to his neck with a cry of joy. 

All was confusion in an instant. " Charles " — "Charlie" 
— " Mr. Moran " — was echoed from lip to lip in proportion 
to the scale «f intimacy which was enjoyed by the several 
speakers. Many a rough hand grasped his, and many a 
good-humoured buffet and malediction he had to endure 
before the tumultuous joy of his old friends had subsided. 
At length after all questions had been answered, and all 
old friends, the dead, the living, and the absent, had been 
tenderly inquired for, young Moran took his place among 
the guests ; the amusements of the evening were renewed, 
and Yamon, who had felt his importance considerably 
diminished by the entrance of the young traveller, began 
to resume his self-constituted sovereignty. 

Oambling, the great curse of society in all climes, 
classes, ages, and states of civilization, was not unknown 
or unpractised in this wild region. Neither was it here 
unattended with its usual effects upon the mind, heart, and 
happiness of its votaries. The eager manifestation of 
assent which passed round the circle, when the proposition 
of just " a hand o' five and-forty" was made, showed that 
it was by no means an unusual or unacceptable resource to 
any person present. The young exile, in particular, 
seemed to catch at it with peculiar readiness ; and, in a 
few minutes, places and partners being arranged, the old 
woman deposited in the middle of the table a pr.ck of cards, 
approaching in shape more to the oval than the oblong 
square, and in colour scarcely distinguishable from the 
black oaken board on which they lay. Custom, however, 
had rendered the players particularly expert at their use, 
and they were dealt round with as much flippancy as the 
newest pack in the hands of a demon of St. James's in our 
own time. One advantage, tertainly, the fashionable 
gamesters possessed over these primitive gamblers : the 



186 THE HAND AND WOBD. 

latter were perfectly ignorant of the useful niceties of play, 
so much in request among the former. Old gentlemen, 
stags, bridges, etc., were matters totally unknown among 
our coast friends, and the only necessary consequences of 
play, in which they (perhaps) excelled, were the out- 
rageous violence, good mouth-filling oaths, and the ferocious 
triumph which followed the winnings or the losses of the 
several parties. 

After he had become so far acquainted with the clingy 
pieces of pasteboard in his hand, as to distinguish the 
almost obliterated impressions upon them, the superior 
jkill of the sea-farer became apparent. Yamon, who 
played against him, soon began to show symptoms of 
turbulence, which the other treated with the most perfect 
coolness and indifference, still persevering in his good play, 
until his opponent, after lavishing abundance of abuse cu 
every body around him, especially on his unfortunate 
partner in the game, acknow ledged that he had no more 
to lose. The night had now grown late, and the guests 
dropping off one by one, Moran and his mother were left 
alone in the cottage. 

" Mother ", said the young man, as he threw the little 
window-shutter open, and admitted a gush of moonlight 
which illumined the whole room, "will you keep tlie 
fire stining till I return : the night is fine, and I must go 
over the cliffs'*. 

" The cliff's ! to-night, child !" ejaculated the old woman. 
" You don't think of it, my heart ?" 

" I must go", was the reply ; " I have given a pledge 
tliat I dare not be false to ". 

" The cliffs !" continued the old woman. " The way is 
uncertain even to the feet that know it best, and sure you 
wouldn't try it in the night, and after being away till you 
don't know, may be, a foot o' the way ". 

"When 1 left Ellen Sparling, mother", said the young 
man, " I pledged her my faith, that I would meet her on 



THE HAND AND WORD. 187 

the night on which she should receive from me a token she 
gave me. She, in like manner, gave me hers. That 
token I sent to her before I entered your doors this evening, 
and I appointed her father's ould house, where he lived in 
his poor days, and where I first saw her, to meet me. I 
must keep my word on all hazards". And he flung the 
cottage-door open as he spoke. 

" Then take care, take care ", said the old woman, 
clasping her hands and extending them towards him, 
while she spoke in her native tongue. " The night, thank 
God ! is a fine night, and the sea is still at the bottom of 
the cliffs, but it is an unsure path. I know the eyes that 
will be red, and the cheeks that will be white, and the 
young and fair ones too, if anything contrary should come 
to you this holy evening ". " I have given her my hand 
and word ", was Morau's reply as he closed the door, and 
took the path over the sand hills. 

The moon was shining brightly when he reached the 
cliff's, and entered on the path leading to the old ren- 
dezvous of the lovers, and from thence to the ruined 
building, where he expected to meet Ellen. He trudgei 
along in the light-heartedness of feeling inspired by the 
conviction he felt, that the happiness of the times, which 
every object he beheld brought to his recollection, had not 
passed away with those days, and that a fair and pleasant 
future yet lay before him. He turned off' the sand-hills 
while luxuriating in those visions of unchecked delight. 

Parsing the rocks of Duggara, he heard the plashing of 
oars, and the rushing of a canoe through the water. It 
seemed to make towards a landing-place further down, 
and lying almost on his path. He pursued his course, 
supposing, as in fact proved to be the case, that it was 
one of the fishermen drawing his canoe nearer to the 
caverns which were to be made the scene of a seal-hunt 
on the following day. As the little vessel glided through 
the water beneath him, a wild song, in the language of 



138 THE HAND AND WORD. 

the country, rose to the broken crag on which he no* 
rested, chaunted by a powerful masculine voice, with all 
the monotonous and melancholy intonation to which the 
construction of the music is peculiarly favourable. The 
following may be taken as a translation of the stanzas :— 



The Priest stood at the marriage board, 

The marriage cake was made: 
With meat the marriage chest was stored, 

Decked was the marriage bed. 
The old man sat beside the fire, 

The mother sat by him, 
The white bride wa9 in gay attire 

But her dark eye was dim, 

Ululah! Ululahl 
The night falls quick — the suu is set, 
Her love is on the water yet. 

II. 

I saw the red cloud in the west, 

Against the morning light, 
Heaven shield the youth that she loves boat 

From evil chance to-night. 
The door flings wide ! Loud moans the galfy 

Wild fear her bosom cbi Is, 
It is, it is the Banthee's wail, 

Over the darkened hills, 

Ululah! Ululah! 
The day is past ! the night is dark ! 
The waves are mounting round his bark 

III. 

The guests sit round the bridal bed, 

And break the bridal cake, 
But they sit by the dead man's head. 

And hold his wedding-wake. 
The bride is praying in her room. 

The place is silent all! 
A fearful call ! a sudden doom ! 

Bridal and funeral ! 

Ululah! Ululah 
A youth to Kilfiehera's ta'en. 
That never will return again. 



THE HAND AND WORD. 189 

Before Moran had descended much further on his way, 
he perceived that the canoe had reached a point of the 
rock close upon his route. The fisherman jumped to land, 
made fast the painter, and turning up the path by which 
Moran was descending, soon encountered him. It was 
Yamon Macauntha. 

" Ho ! Mr. Moran ! Out on the cliffs this hour o' the 
night, sir?" 

" Yes, I have a good way to go. Good by to you n . 

" Easy a while, sir ", said Yamon ; " that is the same 
way I'm going myself, and I'll be with you ". 

Moran had no objection to this arrangement, although 
it was not altogether pleasing to him. He knew enough 
of the temper and habits of the smuggler to believe him 
capable of any design, and although he had been a stronger 
built man than he was, yet the odds, in case of any 
hostile attempt, would be fearfully in Yamon's favour. 
He remembered, too, certain rumours which had reached 
him of the latter being occasionally subject to fits of gloom 
approaching in their strength and intensity to actual 
derangement, and began to hesitate as to the more 
advisable course to be pursued. However, not to mention 
the pusillanimity of anything having the appearance of 
retreat, such a step would in all probability have been 
attempted in vain, for Yamon stood directly behind him, 
and the path was too narrow to admit the possibility of 
a successful struggle. He had only to obey the motion of 
the fisherman and move on. 

" You don't know", said the latter, " or may be you 
never heard of what I'm going to tell you now ; but easy, 
and you'll know all in a minute. DoyoK see that sloping 
rock down by the sea, where the horse-gull is standing at 
this minute, the same we passed a while ago. When my 
mother was little better than seven months married, boiug 
living hant by on the sand-hills, she went many's the time 
dov/u to that lock, to fetch home some of the salt-water 



HO THE HAND AND WORD. 

for pickle and things, and never made any work of going 
down tlierc late and early, and at all hours. Well, it was 
as it might he this way, on a fine bright night, that she 
took her can in her hand, and down with her to the rock. 
The tide was full in, and when she tinned off o' the path, 
what should she see fronting her, out, and sitting quite 
erect intirely upon the rock, only a woman, and she 
having the tail of her gown turned up over her head, and 
she sitting quite still, and never spaking a word, and her 
back towards my mother. ' Diea uth ', says my mother, 
careless and civil, thinking of nothing, and wanting her to 
move ; hut she took no notice. * Would it be troubling 
you if I'd just step down to get a drop o' the salt-water?' 
says my mother. Still no auswer. So thinking it might 
be one of the neighbours that was funning, or else that it 
might be asleep she was, she asked her very plain and 
loud to move out o' the way. When there wasn't ere a 
word come after this, my mother stooped forward a little, 
and lifted the goivnd from the woman's forehead, and 
peeped under — and what do you think she seen in the 
dark within ? Two eyes as red as fire, and a shrivclly old 
face without any lips hardly, and they drawn back, and 
teeth longer than lobster's claws, and as white as the 
bleached bones. Her heart was down in her brogue* 
when it started up from her, and with a screech that made 
t>vo halves of ray mother's brains, it flew out over the 
wide sea. 

"My mother went home and took to her bed, from 
which she never stirred till 'twas to be taken to Kil- 
fiehera church-yard. It was in that week I was born. I 
never pass that place at night alone, if I can help it — 
a. id that is partly the reason why I made so free to ask 
you to bear me company". 

Morau had his confidence fully reestablished by these 
words. He thought he saw in Yamon a wretch so 
♦Shoe. 



THE HAND AND WORD. 141 

preyed upon by remorse and superstition, as to be in- 
capable of contemplating any deep crime, to which he had 
not a very great temptation. As Yamon still looked 
toward the rock beneath, the enormous horse-gull by 
which he had first indicated its position to Moran, took 
flight, and winged its way slowly to the elevation on 
which they stood. The bird rose above, wheeled round 
them, and with a shrill cry, that was repeated by a hun- 
dred echoes, dived again into the darkness underneath. 
Moran, at this instant, had his thoughts turned in 
another direction altogether, by the sight of the little 
recess in which Ellen and he had held their last con- 
versation. He entered, followed by Yamon, who threw 
himself on the rude stone seat, observing that it was a 
place " for the phuka to make her bed in". 

The young traveller folded his arms, and gazed around 
for a few minutes in silence, his heart striving beneath the 
load of recollections which came upon him at every glance 
and motion. On a sudden, a murmured sound of voices 
was heard underneath, and Moran stooped down, and 
overlooked the brink of the tremendous precipice. There 
was a flashing of lights on the calm waters beneath, and 
in a few minutes a canoe emerged from the great cavern, 
bearing three or four men, with lighted torches, which, 
however, they extinguished as soon as they came into the 
clear moonlight. He continued to mark them until they 
were lost behind a projecting crag. He then turned, and 
in removing his hand detached a pebble, which, falling 
after a long pause into the sea, formed what is called by 
the peasant children, who practise it in sport, " a dead 
man's skull". It is formed when a stone is cast into 
the water, so as to emit no spray, but cutting rapidly 
and keenly through, in its descent, produces a gurgling 
evolution, bearing a momentary resemblance to the 
tables of a human skull. The sound ceased, and all 
again was still and silent, with the exception of tho 



142 THE HAND AND WORD. 

sound which the stirring of the waters made in the mighty 
cavern beneath. 

" I remember the time when that would have won » 
button* for me ", said Moran, turning round. He at the 
same instant felt his shoulder grasped with a tremendous 
force. He looked quickly up, and beheld Yamon, his eyes 
staring and wild with some frantic purpose, bending over 
him. A half uttered exclamation of terror escaped him, 
and he endeavoured to spring towards the path which led 
from the place. The giant arm of Yamon, however, 
intercepted him. 

"Give me, cheat and plunderer that you are", cried the 
fisherman, while his limbs trembled with emotion, "give 
me the money you robbed me of this night, or by the 
great light that's looking down on us, I'll shake you to 
pieces ". 

" There, Yamon, there : you have my life in your 
power — there is your money, and now — " He felt the 
grasp of the fisherman tightening upon his throat. He 
struggled, as a wretch might be expected to do, to whom 
life was new and dear ; but he was as a child in the gripe 
of his enemy. There was a smothering shriek of entreaty 
— a wild attempt to twine himself in the limbs and frame 
of the murderer — and in the next instant he was hurled 
over the brow of the cliff. 

" Another ! another life !" said Yamon Dhu, as with 
hands stretched out, and fingers spread, as though yet 
in act to grasp, he looked out over the precipice. " The 
water is still again — Ha ! who calls me ? — From the ca- 
verns ? — No. — Above ? — Another life ! — A deal of Chris- 
tian's blood upon one man's soul !" and he rushed from the 
place. 

About eleven o'clock on the following morning (as fine 
a day as could be), a young lad named Terry Mick (Terry, 

• The practice of playing for buttons is very common among the 
peasant children. 



THE HAND AND WORD. 148 

the son of Mbk, a species of patronymic very usual in 
Ireland), entered, with considerable haste, the kitchen of 
Mr. Morty Shannon, a gentleman farmer, besides being 
coroner of the county, and as jolly a man as any in the 
neighbourhood. Terry addressed a brief tale in the ear of 
Aby Galaghar, Mr. Shannon's steward and fac-totum, 
which induced the said Sandy to stretch his long, well- 
seasoned neck, from the chimney-corner, and directing his 
voice towards the door of an inner room, which was 
complimented with the appellation of a parlour, exclaimed : 
" Mr. Morty ! you're calling, sir ". 

"Who am I calling?" asked a rich, waggish voice, from 
within. 

" Mr. Sparling, the Palatine's boy, sir ", replied Aby, 
quite unconscious of the quid pro quo. 

" Indeed ! More than I knew myself. Walk in, Terry ". 
" Go in to him, Terry dear ", said Aby, resuming his 
comfortable position in the chimney-coiner, and fixing a 
musing, contented eye upon a great cauldron of potatoes 
that hung over the turf-fire, and on which the first sim- 
mering froth, or white horse (as it is called in Irish 
cottages), had begun to appear. 

" The master sent me to you, sir ", said Teny, opening 
the door, and protruding an eye, and half a face intc the 

sanctum sanctorum, " to know with his compliments " 

But first, I should let you have the glimpse that Terry 
got of the company within. The person to whom he 
immediately addressed himself sat at one end of a small 
deal table, on which were placed a jug of cold water, a 
broken bowl, half filled with coarse brown sugar, and a 
little jar, which, by the frequent changes of position it 
underwent, seemed to contain the favourite article of the 
three. Imagine to yourself a middle sized man, with stout, 
well-set limbs, a short and thick head of hair, an indented 
forehead, eyes of a piercing gray, bright and sparkling, with 
an expression between leer and satire, and a nose running in 



144 THE HAND AND WORD. 

a curvilineal direction toward the mouth. Nature had, in the 
first instance, given it a sinister inclination, and chance, 
wishing to rectify the morals of the feature, had by the 
agency of a black -thorn stick in the hands of a rebellious te- 
nant, sent it again to the right. Twas kindly meant, as Mr. 
Morty himself used to say, though not dexterously executed. 

" The master's compliments, sir", continued Terry, " to 
know if your honour would just step over to Kilkee, 
where there has been a bad business this morning — 
Charlie Moran being lying dead, on the broad of his back, 
at the house, over". 

When I say that an expression of involuntary sa- 
tisfaction, uhich he in vain endeavoured to conceal, 
diffused itself over the tortuous countenance of the 
listener at this intelligence, it is necessary I should save 
his character by reminding the reader that he was a 
county coroner, and in addition to the four pounds which 
he was to receive for the inquest, there was the chance of 
an invitation to stay and dine with the Sparlings, people 
whose mode of living Mr. Morty had before now tried 
and approved. 

" Come here, Terry, and take your morning", said he, 
filling a glass of ardent spirits, which the youth im- 
mediately disposed of with a speed that showed a 
sufficient familiarity with its use, although some affec- 
tation of mincing decency induced him to colour the 
delicious relish with a grimace and shrug of comical 
dislike, as he replaced the glass on the table. 

" E'then, that's good stuff, please your honour. Sure 
I'd know the master's anywhere over the world. This is 
some of the two year old, sir. 'Twas made the time Mr. 
Grady, the guager, was stationed below there, at the 
white house — and faix, many a drop he tasted of it him- 
self, in the master's barn". 

" And is the still so long at work, Terry ?" 

" Oh, long life to you, sir, — aye is it and longer too 



THE HAND AND WORD. 143 

The master has seek a 'cute way with him in managing 
the still-hunters. Tis in vain for people to inform: to 
be sure, two or three tried it, but got nothing by it, 
barring a good lacing at the next fair-day. Mr. Grady 
used regularly to send notice when he got an information, 
to have him on his guard against he'd eome with the 
army — and they never found anything there, I'll be 
your bail for it, more than what served to send 'em 
home as drunk as pipers, every mother's son. To be 
sure, that Mr. Grady was a pleasant man, and well liked 
wherever he came, among high and low, rich and poor, 
although being a guager and a Protestant. I remember 
miking him laugh hearty enough orce. He asked me, 
says he, as it might be funning: 'Terry', says he, ' I'm 
very bad inwardly. How would you like to be walking 
after a guager's funeral this morning?' ' Why thin, Mr. 
Grady', says I, * I'd rather see a thousand of your religion 
dead than yourself, and meaning no love for you, neither'. 
And poor man, he did laugh hearty, to be sure. He had 
no pride in him — no pride, more than a child, had'nt Mr. 
Grady. God's peace be with him wherever he is this day". 
In a few minutes Mr. Shannon's blind mare was 
saddled, and the head of the animal being directed 
toward Kilkee, away went Terry, trotting by the coroner's 
side, and shortening the road with his quaint talk. On 
arriving at the Palatine's house, they found it crowded 
with the inhabitants of the village. The fairy doctor of 
the district sat near the door ; his brown and weather- 
beaten face wrapped in an extraordinary degree of mystery, 
and his eyes fixed with the assumption of deep thought on 
his twirling thumbs: in another part of the outer room 
was the schoolmaster of the parish, discussing the 
"crowner's quest law" to a circle of admiring listeners. 
In the chimney-corner, on stools which were ranged for 
the purpose, were congregated the "kuowledgable" women 
of the district. Two soldiers, detached from the nearest 



146 THE HAND AND WORD. 

guard, were stationed at the door, and at a little distance 
from them, seated at a table, and basking in the morning 
sunshine, might be seen a number of fishermen and others, 
all deeply engaged in converse upon the occurrence which 
had summoned them together. One of them was in the 
act of speaking when the coroner arrived : — 

" We had been drawing the little canoe up hard by tho 
cavern, seeing would we be the first to be in upon the 
seals when the hunt would begin, when I see a black thing 
lying on the shore among the sea-weed, about forty yards 
or upwards from the rock where I stood; and 'tisnt itself 
I see first, either, only two sea-gulls, and one of 'em 
perched upon it, while the other kep wheeling round 
above it, and screaming as nait'rel as a christen ; and so 
1 ran down to Phil, here, and says I: 'There's murder 
down upon the rocks, let us have it in from the fishes '. 
So we brought it ashore. 'Twas pale and stiff, but there 
was no great harm done to it, strange to say, in regard 
of the great rocks, and the place. We knew poor Moran's 
face, and we said nothing to one another, only wrapt the 
spritsail about it, and had it up here to Mr. Sparling's 
(being handier to us than his own mother's), where we 
told (£\v story ". 

Passing into the house, Mr. Morty Shannon was 
received with all the respect due to his exalted station. 
The woimn curk-ied low, and the men raised their hands 
to their foreheads with that courteous action which is 
familiar to all, even the most unenlightened of the pea- 
santry of the south of Ireland. The mastei of the mansion, 
a comfortable-looking farmer-like sort of person, rose from 
his scat near the hearth, and greeted the man of office 
with an air of greater familiarity, yet with a reserve 
becoming the occasioa. As the door of an inner apartment 
stood open, Mr. Shannon could see the corpse of the 
murdered man laid out on a table near the window. Close 
to the head stood the mother of the dead, hanging over 



THE HAND AND WORD. 147 

tho corpse in silent grief, swaying herself backward and 
forward with a gentle motion, and wringing her hands ; 
yet with so noiseless an action, that the profound silence of 
the room was never broken. On the opposite side, her 
fine head resting against the bier — her white, wan fingers 
wreathed together in earnest prayer above the body, 
while a half-stifled sob occasionally shook her delicate frame 
— and her long and curling tresses fell in flaxen masses 
over the bosom of the murdered, knelt Moran's betrothed 
love, Ellen Sparling. As she prayed, a sudden thought 
seemed to rush upon her, she raised her head, took from 
her bosom a light green ribbon, and kissing it fervently 
and repeatedly, she folded and placed it in that of the 
murdered youth, after which fhe resumed her kneeling 
posture. There are few, I believe, who have lived among 
scones of human suffering to so little purpose as not to be 
aware, that it is not the heaviness of a particular calamity, 
nor the violence of the sorrow which it produces, that is 
at any time most powerful in awakening the commiseration 
of an uninterested spectator. The capability of deep feeling 
may be more or less a property of all hearts, but the 
power of communicating it is a gift possessed by few. 
The murmur of a bruised heart, the faint sigh of a broken 
spirit, will often stir and thrill through all the strings of 
sympathy, while the frantic ravings of a wilder, though 
not less real woe, shall fail to excite any other sensation 
than that of pain and uneasiness. Perhaps it may be, that 
the selfishness of our nature is such, that we are alarmed 
and put on our guard, in proportion to the violence 
of the appeal which is made to us, and must be taken by 
surprise, before our benevolent emotions can be awakened. 
However all this might be, being no philosopher, I can 
only state the fact, that Mr. Morty Shannon, who had 
witnessed many a scene of frantic agony without ex- 
periencing any other feeling than that of impatience, 
was moved, even to a forgetfulness of his office, by the 



148 THE HAND AND WORD. 

quiet, unobtrusive grief which he witnessed on entering 
this apartment. 

It was the custom in those days, and is still the custom 
in most parts of Ireland, where any person is supposed to 
have " come by his end " unfairly, that all the inhabitants 
of his parish, or district, particularly those who, from any 
previous circumstances, may be rendered at all liable to 
suspicion, shall meet together and undergo a kind of ordeal, 
by touching the corpse, each in his turn. Among a super- 
stitious people, such a regulation as this, simple though 
it was, had been frequently successful in betraying the 
guilty conscience ; and it was a current belief among the 
peasantry, that in many instances where the perpetrator of 
the horrid deed possessed strength of mind or callousness 
of heart suflicient to subdue all appearance of emotion in 
the moment of trial, some miraculous change in the corpse 
itself had been known to indicate the evil doer. At a" 
events, there was a degree of solemnity and importance at- 
tached to the test, which invested it with a strong interest 
in the minds of the multitude. 

Suspicion was not idle on this occasion. The occurrences 
of the previous evening at the widow's house, and the loss 
there sustained by Yamon, contributed in no slight degree 
to fix the attention of the majority upon him. It did not 
pass without remark, neither, that he had not yet made 
his appearance at Mr. Sparling's house. Many wild talcs, 
moreover, were afloat respecting Ellen Sparling, who had on 
that morning, before sunrise, been seen by a fish jolter, who 
was driving his mule loaded with fish aloug the road towards 
Kilrush, returning across the hills towards her father's house, 
more like a mad woman than a sober Christian. Before we 
proceed further in our tale, it is necessary we should say 
something of the circumstances which led to this appearance. 
When Ellen received the token on the previous eveuing 
from young Moran's messenger, she tied her light chec- 
quercd straw bonnet under her chin, and stole out by a 



THE HAND AND WORD. J 49 

back entrance, with a beating and anxious heart, to the 
appointed rendezvous. The old ruined house which had 
been named to her, was situated at the distance of a mile 
from her father's, and was at present tenanted only by an 
aged herdsman in his employment. Not finding Moran 
yet arrived, although the sun was already in the west, she 
sent the old man away on some pretext, and took hia 
place in the little rush-bottomed chair by the fire-side. 
Two hours of a calm and silent evening had already passed 
away, and yet he came not. Wearied with the long 
expectation, and by the tumult of thoughts and feelings 
which agitated her, she arose, walked to a short distance 
from the cottage, and sitting on a little knoll in the 
vicinity, which commanded a wide prospect of the sea, 
she continued to await his arrival, now and then gazing in 
the direction of the cliffs by which the messenger told her 
he was to pass. No object, however, met her eye on that 
path, and no sound came to her ear but the loud, full- 
toned, and plaintive whistle of the ploughman, as he 
guided his horses over a solitary piece of stubble-ground, 
lightening his own and their labour by the wild modulations 
of the Keen-the-cawn, or death-wail ; the effect of which, 
though it had often delighted her under other circumstances, 
fell now with an oppressive influence upon her spirits. 

Night fell at length, and she returned to the old house. 
As she reached the neglected haggart on the approach, 
a light breeze sprang up inland, and rustling in the 
thatch of the ruined out-houses, startled her by its sud- 
denness, almost as much as if it had been a living voice. 
She looked up an instant, drew her handkerchief closer 
arouud her neck, and hurried on towards the door. It 
might be he had arrived by another path during her 
absence ! High as her heart bounded at the suggestion, 
it sunk in proportion as she lifted the latch, and entered 
the deserted room. The turf-embers were almost expiring 
on the hearth, and all was dark, cold, saddening, and 



150 THE HAND AND WORD. 

comfortless. She felt vexed at the absence of the Did ser- 
vant, and regretted the caution which induced her to get rid 
of hirn. Amid all the intensity of her fondness, too, she 
could not check a feeling of displeasure at the apparent 
want of ardour on the part of her lover. It had an almost 
slighting look ; she determined she would make it evident 
in her manner on his arrival. In the next moment the 
fancied sound of a footstep made her spring from her seat, 
and extend her arms in a perfect oblivion of all her stern 
resolutions. Quite beaten down in heart by constant dis- 
appointments, and made nervous and feverish by anxiety, 
the most fearful suggestions began now to take place 
of her pettishness and ill-humour. She was alarmed for 
his safety. It was a long time since he had trod the path 
over the cliffs. The possibility that here rushed upon her, 
made her cover her face with her hands, and bend forward 
in her chair in an agony of terror. 

Midnight now came on. A short and heavy breathing 
at the door, as she supposed, startled her as she bent over 
the flame which she kept alive by placing fresh sods on the 
embers. She rose and went to the door. A large New- 
foundland dog of her father's bounded by her as she 
evened it, and testified by the wildest gambols about the 
kitchen, the delight he felt in meeting her so unexpectedly, 
at such an hour, and so far from her home. She patted the 
faithful animal on the head, and felt restored in spirits by 
the presence even of this uncommunicative acquaintance. 
The sagacious servant had evidently traced her to the 
ruin by the fineness of its sense, and seemed overjoyed at 
the verification of his diagnostic. At length, after having 
sufficiently indulged the excitement of the moment, he 
took post before the fire, and after divers indecisive 
evolutions, he coiled himself up at her feet and slept. The 
maiden herself in a short time imitated the example. 

The startling suggestions that had been crowding on 
her in her waking moments, now began to shape them- 



THE HAND AND WORD. 151 

lelves in vivid and fearful visions to her sleeping fancy. 
As she lay back in her chair, her eyes not so entirely 
closed as to exclude the "lengthening rays" of the de- 
caying fire before them, she became unaccountably op- 
pressed by the sense of a person sitting close at her side. 
There was a hissing, as if of water falling on the embers 
just before the figure, and after a great effort she fancied 
that she could turn so far round as to recognise the face 
of her lover, pale, cold, with the long dark hair hanging 
drearily at each side, and as she supposed, dripping with 
moisture. She strove to move, but was perfectly unable 
to do so, and the figure continued to approach her, until 
at length, placing his chilling face so close to her cheek, 
that she thought she felt the damp upon her neck, he said 
gently : " Ellen, I have kept my hand and word : living, I 
would have done it; dead, I am permitted". At this 
moment a low grumbling bark from the dog Minos awoke 
her, and she started from her seat, in a state of ner- 
vousness which for a short time prevented a full con- 
viction of the non-existence of the vision that had op- 
pressed her slumber. The dog was sitting erect, and 
gazing with crouched head, fixed eyes, and lips upturned 
in the expression of canine fear, toward the door. Ellen 
listened attentively for a few minutes, and a gentle 
knocking was heard. She recognised too, or thought she 
recognised, a voice precisely similar to that of the figure 
in her dream, which pronounced her name with the 
gentlest tone in the world. What surprised her most, 
was that Minos, instead of starting fiercely up as was his 
wont on hearing an unusual sound at night, cowed, whim- 
pered, and slunk back into the chimney-corner. Not in 
the least doubting that it was her lover, she rose and 
opened the door. The vividness of her dream, being yet 
fresh upon her, and perhaps the certainty she felt of seeing 
him, made her imagine for the instant that she beheld the 
same figure (standing before her. It was but for an 



152 THE HAND AND WORD. 

instant, however ; on looking a second time, there was no 
person to be seen. An overwhelming sensation of terror 
now rushed upon her, and she fled from the place with th» 
rapidity of madness. In a state half-frantic, half-fainting, 
she reached her father's house, and flung herself on her bed, 
where the news of Moran's death reached her next morning. 
To return, however, to the present position of our tale. 
A certain number of the guests were now summoned into 
the room where the body lay, and all things were prepared 
for the ordeal. At a table near the window, with writing 
materials before him, was placed the worthy coroner, 
together with the lieutenant of the guard at the light- 
house, who had arrived a few miuutes before. Mr. 
Sparling stood close by them, his face made up into an ex- 
pression of wise abstraction, his hands thrust into his 
breeches pockets, and jingliug some half-pence which they 
contained. The betrothed lover of the murdered man had 
arisen from her knees, and put on a completely altered 
manner. She now stood in silence, and with tearless eyes, 
at the head of the bier, gazing with an earnestness of pur- 
pose, which might have troubled the carriage even of diffi- 
dent innocence itself, into the face of every one who ap- 
proached to touch the body. Having been aware of the sus- 
picions afloat against Yamon, and the grounds for those 
suspicions, she expected with impatience the arrival of that 
person. 

He entered at length. All eyes were instantly turned 
on him. There was nothing unusual in the manner or ap- 
pearance of the man. He glanced round the room, 
nodded to a few, touched his forehead to the coroner and 
the lieutenant, and then walking firmly and coolly to the 
centre of the apartment, awaited his turn for the trial. A 
very close observer might have detected a quivering and 
wincing of the eyelid, as he looked toward Ellen 
Sparling, but it was only momentary, and he did not 
glance in that direction a second time. 



THE HAND AND WORD. 153 

" Isn't that droll,* Shawr. ?" whispered Terry in the ear 
of the fairy doctor, who stood near him. The latter did 
not deem it convenient to answer in words, but he com- 
pressed his lips, contracted his brows, and threw an 
additional portion of empty wisdom into his physiognomy. 
" E'then", continued Terry, *' only mark Tim Fouloo 
going to touch the dead corpse all a' one any body would 
Bispect him to be taking the life of a chicken, the lahu- 
muthawn" (half-natural), as a foolish looking, open- 
mouthed, open-eyed young booby advanced in his turn in 
a slow waddling gait to the corpse, and passing his hand 
over the face, retired with a stare of comic stupidity, 
which, notwithstanding the awful occasion, provoked a 
smile from many of the spectators. 

Yamon was the last person who approached the corpse. 
From the moment he entered, the eye of Ellen Sparling 
had never been withdrawn from him for an instant, 
and its expression now became vivid and intense. He 
walked to the place, however, with much indifference, and 
passed bis hand slowly and repeatedly over the cheek and 
brow of the dead man. Many a head was thrust forward, 
as if in expectation that the inanimate lump of clay might 
stir beneath the feeler's touch. But no miracle took place, 
and they gazed on one another in silence as he slowly 
turned away, and folding his arms, resumed his place in 
the centre of the apartment. 

" Well, Mr. Sparling", said his worship the coroner, " here 
is so much time lost : had we begun to take evidence at once, 
the business would be nearly at an end by this time ". 

The old Palatine was about to reply, when their 
conversation was interrupted by an exclamation of surprise 
from Ellen Sparling. Turning quickly round, they beheld 
her with one of the clenched hauds of the corpse between 
hers, gazing on it in stirless amazement. Between the 

* " Droll", in Ireland, means simply, extraordinary and dues not 
necessarily excite a comic association. 



154 THE HAND AND WORD. 

dead-stiff fingers appeared something of a bluish colour 
slightly protruded. Using the utmost strength of which 
she was mistress, Ellen forced open the hand, and took 
from it a small part of the lappel of a coat, with a button 
attached. And letting the hand fall, she rushed through 
the crowd, putting all aside without looking at one, until 
she stood before Yamon. A glance was sufficient. In 
the death-struggle, the unhappy Moran had torn away 
this portion of his murderer's dress, and the rent was 
visible at the moment. 

" The murderer ! blood for blood !" shrieked the frantic 
girl, grasping his garment, and looking almost delirious 
with passion. All was confusion and uproar. Yamon 
darted one fierce glance around, and sprung toward the 
open door, but Ellen Sparling still clung as with a 
drowning grasp to her hold. He put forth the utmost of 
his giant strength to detach himself from her, but in 
vain. All his efforts seemed only to increase her strength, 
while they diminished his own. At last he bethought him of 
his fishing-knife ; he plucked it from his belt and buried it 
in her bosom. The unfortunate girl relaxed her hold, 
reeled, and fell on the corpse of her lover, while Yamon 
bounded to the door. Poor Terry crossed his way, but 
one blow laid him sprawling senseless on the earth, and no 
one cared to tempt a second. The rifles of the guard 
were discharged after him, as he darted over the sand- 
hills ; but just before the triggers were pulled, his foot 
tripped against a loose stone, he fell, and the circumstance 
perhaps saved his life (at least the marksmen said so). 
He was again in rapid flight before the smoke cleared away. 
" Shiiil! Shuill* The sand hills ! the cliffs !" was now 
the general shout, and the chase immediately commenced. 
Many minutes elapsed ere they arrived at the cliffs, and 
half a dozen only of the most nimble-footed just reached 
the spot in time to witness the last desperate resource of 
* Come 1 Como 1 



THE HAND AND WORE. 155 

the murderer. He stood and looked over his shoulder for 
an instant, then rushing to the verge of the cliff, where it 
walled in the land to a height of forty feet, he waved his 
hand to his pursuers, and east himself into the sea. 

The general opinion was that he had perished, but 
there was no trace ever seen that could make such a con- 
summation certain. The body was never found, and it 
was suspected by a few, that, incredible as the story might 
appear, he had survived the leap, and gained the little 
rocky island opposite. 

The few who returned at dusk to Mr. Sparling's house, 
found it the abode of sorrow, of silence, and of death. 
Even the voice of the hired keener was not called in on 
this occasion to mock the real grief that sat on every 
brow and in every heart. The lovers were waked U> 
gether, and buried in the same gravo at Kilfiehera. 



THE BARBER OF BAMTRY. 



CHAPTER I. 



There is a small river which, rising amid the wildest arm 
•east cultivated upland of the county of Limerick in 
Ireland, pursues its lonesome course amid heath and bog, 
by cliff and quarry, through scenery of the bleakest and 
yet the most varied kinds, until it discharges its dis- 
coloured waters into the bosom of the Lower Shannon. 
Now gliding, deep and narrow, through some heathy 
plain, it presents a surface no wider than a meadow 
streamlet, and, like placid characters in the world, in- 
dicating its depth by its tranquillity ; anon, it falls in one 
white and foamy volume over the brow of some 
precipitous crag, at the foot of which it dilates into a 
pool of tolerable extent. Further down it may be traced 
through the intricacies of a stunted wood, now babbling 
in one broad sheet over the limestone shallow ; now 
rolling silent, deep, and dark, beneath the overhanging 
brier and hazel bushes that fling their tangled foliage 
across the waters from the indented bank. In another 
place, it may be found dashing noisily from ledge to ledge 
of some opposing mass of limestone, or pursuing its swift 
t»nd gurgling course along the base of a perpendicular cliff, 
until, as it approaches the mighty river in which its waters 
are received, it acquires surface and depth sufficient to 
float the fisher's skiff, and the small cot or lighter that 
conveys a lading of marl or sea-weed to manure the little 



THE BARBER OF BANTRT. 157 

potato garden of the humble agriculturist upon its banks. 
Nor even in this dreary region is the wild streamlet wholly 
destitute of animated figures to give a quickening interest 
to the general loneliness of the scenery along its side. 
The neighbouring cottager " snares" for pike and salmon 
in its shallows ; the cabin housewife beetles her linen in 
the summer evening on its banks, and the barefoot and 
bareheaded urchin, standing or sitting by the side of an 
overhanging ash or elder, drops his pin-hook baited with 
an earthworm into the deep and shaded corner which ho 
knows by profitable experience to be the favourite haunt 
of the eel and trout ; and in which it may be said, in 
passing, his simple apparatus is often as destructive as all 
the erudite machinery of Izaak Walton and his disciples. 

In the summer season the appearance of this little river 
is such as we have described. In the winter, however, 
after the great rains, common in mountain scenery, have 
set in, the shallow bed of the stream is often filled, in the 
course of a few minutes, with a body of water, collected 
from the heights around its source, that presents a 
formidable contrast to the usually placid tenor of its course. 
It is then seen roaring and foaming along in one huge, 
yellow flood, inundating not unfrequently the cottages and 
hamlets near its banks, and carrying dismay and death 
among pigs, poultry, and other anti-aquatic animals, Avho 
happen to stray within reach of its overflowing current, 
and sometimes even placing life in jeopardy. 

Not far from the banks of the river, and commanding a 
full prospect of its windings through a varied and exten- 
sive, though wild and thinly populated landscape, may be 
seen at this day the walls of a roofless mansion, which 
bears in its decay the marks of having been once inhabited 
by persons somewhat superior in rank to the "stroug 
farmers" who, with few exceptions, constitute at present 
the sole aristocracy of the district. The style of the mason- 
work (the sounding term architecture would be somewhat 



158 THE BARBER OF BANTRT. 

misapplied to so simple an edifice) refers the date of its 
erection, and indeed correctly, to the beginning of the last 
century. The small windows arc nearly square, and deep 
set in the massy stonework, while the lofty gables, com- 
prising more than half the height of the whole building, 
present, when viewed from the end, an angle almost as 
acute as that of a wedge. Around, in a still more dilapi- 
dated condition than the dwelling house, may be traced 
the ruins of numerous out-offices, the stable, the cow-house, 
the turf-house, the piggery, the fowl- house, and even (a 
contrast to the present poverty of the surrounding country) 
the coach-house. At a little distance, the urchins of the 
neighbourhood point out the remains of earthen fences, not 
much more distinct than the immortal Roman entrenchment 
of Monkbarns, as all that is left of what was once the 
kitchen and flower-garden. Polyanthuses, almost dwindled 
into primroses, bachelors'- buttons impoverished both in 
size and colour, and a gooseberry or currant bush, choked 
up in furze, furnish corroborative testimony to the tradi- 
tion. The neighbouring peasantry still preserve the history 
of the building from its earliest foundation, as well as of 
its successive owners, who were persons of no little noto- 
riety in their time. 

In the beginning of the last century, the tract of land 
on which the ruin stands was purchased by a certain Mr. 
Patrick Moynehan (more commonly known by the familiar 
diminutive Paddy Monehan, or Paddy the Lad). As, 
although respectably descended, Mr. Moynehan was not 
heir to any property whatever, and as his subsequent 
habits did not furnish any indications of that thrift which 
Shylock tells us, 

" Is blessing, if men steal it not", 

there was very general whispering, and great perplexity as 
to how Paddy Moynehan could have acquired the meana 
of purchasing an estate, and building a handsome house. 



THE BARBER OF BANTRY. 159 

As the stories circulated upon the subject were numerous, 
and characteristic both of the place and period, we will 
venture to relate a few. 

It was said by some, that on an occasion, when yet a 
young man, Pat Moynehan went to attend the " berrin " 
of a friend. While the remainder of the crowd were occu- 
pied at their devotions in the place of death, young Moy- 
nehan, little impressed by the solemnity of the scene before 
him, rambled about among the graves, "funning" and 
amusing himself, and paying little attention to the severe 
glances that were occasionally directed towards him from 
the kneeling crowd. On one occasion, it happened that he 
found, placed upon the corner of a monument, a bleached 
skull, the eyeless sockets directed towards him, and seeming 
to convey a more terrible rebuke than ever could have 
proceeded from the eyes that once moved within their 
orbits. Moynehan, however, was nothing checked in his 
career of mirth. 

" Look there !" he said, pointing out the skull to a com- 
panion, who in vain endeavoured to repress his unsea- 
sonable levity, " much as you think of yourself, that was 
once as fine a man as you are, and you'll have as ugly a 
grin upon your own face yet ; he was just as good a 
gentleman, and as devout a Christian". Then turning to 
the skull, and taking off his hat with an air of mock 
politeness, he added : "I am happy, sir, to have the 
pleasure of making your acquaintance, and will feel obliged 
by your giving me the honour of your company at breakfast 
next Sunday". And off he turned with another bow of 
mock respect, and left the churchyard with his companion. 

Before breakfast hour on the following Sunday (the 
legend still continues), young Moynehan went out to speak 
with a neighbour ; while he was absent, and while the 
servant girl was occupied in preparing breakfast, the door 
was opened from without, and " a big man" entered. He 
did not say " God save you", nor " God bless you", as he 



160 THE BAREEP. OF BANTRT. 

came in, and walked silently to a chair that stood near the 
fire, and took his seat without speaking. His singular 
conduct was but the counterpart of his appearance. His 
dress was that of a gentleman, and rich, but so grotesque 
in form, and strange in material, that it was impossible to 
decide on the rank or country of the wearer. A high 
standing collar, a flowered silk waistcoat, ruffles at the 
wrists, a handsome pair of plush under garments, with 
golden knee-buckles, and silver ones of an enormous size 
across the insteps of his square-toed shoes ; these, together 
with a well -powdered head of hair, brushed backward and 
gathered behind into a handsome queue, a cocked hat, 
which he carried under his arm, and a slender rapier by 
his side, constituted the chief portion of that costume 
which looked so perplexing in the eyes of the mountain 
handmaiden. With all this, there was in the expression 
of his eyes, and ia the mechanical regularity of his move- 
ments, an air of she knew not what, that chilled the spirit 
of the young woman, and left her scarce the power to ask 
his business. Being, however, naturally of a free and 
hearty disposition, she did not suffer herself to be altogether 
daunted, but said, in a laughing manner, and after waiting 
a considerable time to hear him speak : 

"Why, then, sir, arn't you a droll gentleman, to walk 
into a house in that kind o' way, an' sate yourself without 
sayin' a ha'p'orth ?" 

The stranger looked fixedly at her. " It is a law where 
I come from", says he, " that none of us shall speak until 
we are spoken to ; and if the same law prevailed among 
people I know here, there are many of their friends that 
would have reason to be glad of it. But wherc's the man 
o' the house? isn't it a shame for him to ask a gen- 
tleman to breakfast with him, and not to be at home 
before hira ?" 

While he was speaking, Moynehan entered. 

" Isn't it a burning shame for you", said the stranger, 



THE BARBER OF BAKTRY. 161 

in a loud voice, " to ask a gentleman to breakfast with 
you, and not to be at home before him ?" 

" Me ask you to breakfast !" exclaimed the astonished 
Moynehan ; " I never laid eyes on you before ; but you 
are as welcome as if you got fifty invitations". 

" Indeed, but you did ask me", said the stranger, 
" and I'll tell you where, too" ; — and stooping over towards 
him, he whispered in his ear. 

The instant Moynehan heard the whisper, he fell in a 
death-like faint upon the floor. The stranger showed not 
the least concern, nor made any effort to relieve him, but 
waited with the utmost indifference until he should revive. 
While he was yet insensible, the girl, standing in awe of 
this mysterious guest, requested him to sit down to 
breakfast. 

" No, no", he answered ; " I can eat nothing until 
your master sits with me ; it was with him I came to 
breakfast". 

When Moynehan came to himself, understanding from 
the girl what the stranger had said, he repeated the invi- 
tation, which was immediately accepted, and both sat 
down together. The effect of the first shock having passed 
away, Moynehan made up his mind to perform the part of 
host with true Irish hospitality. He laughed, talked, 
jested, told his best stories, shook his guest by both hands 
together, and protested that he was as welcome " as a rose 
in June". He ordered the freshest eggs, and fried the 
richest bacon, and treated the stranger with the most per- 
fect hospitality. 

They had scarcely done breakfast, when a bell was 
beard ringiug at a distance. 

"What's that bell?" asked the stranger, in a sharp 
tone. 

"Oh, it's nothing", said Moynehan, with a careless air; 
" only the bell for chapel". 

The stranger said nothing, but looked very serious. At 



162 THE BARBER OF BANTRT. 

length, rising from his chair, he addressed his host as 
follows : — 

" You're an honest fellow, after all, and you may thank 
your hearty, hospitable conduct that I do not make you 
suffer severely for the trouble you gave me by your invi- 
tation ; however, you must not say that you gave youi 
breakfast for nothing. Meet me this evening by the elder 
tree near the river side, and you shall hear something that 
you will thank me for''. 

Moynehan kept the appointment, and those who gave 
credit to the story (and they comprised no small portion 
of the inhabitants of the surrounding cottages) asserted 
that during their evening conference, his unearthly visitor 
revealed to him a quantity of bidden treasure in a neigh- 
bouring ruin, more than sufficient to warrant the expensive 
style in which he soon began to live ; others, while they 
admitted the truth of the greater portion of the story, 
denied that there was anything supernatural in the case. 
They asserted that the whole was a hoax played upon 
Moynehan, by a young man, a stranger in the place, who 
observed his conduct at the funeral, and availed himself 
of the mock invitation which he overheard, to read the 
wag a lesson, and to help himself to a comfortable break- 
fast. It was certain, indeed, that Movnehan himself never 
liked to have the story alluded to in his hearing, but this 
circumstance was urged, by the advocates of the won- 
derful, as evidence in favour of their own version of the 
tale. Those who contended for the common-place, were 
in the habit of accounting for Moynehan's great accession 
of wealth by other than supernatural means. He had 
become engaged, they said, in common with many other 
persons in his time, in a species of commerce which is 
viewed with a jealous eye by all governments; and by his 
share in the disposal of two or three cargoes of tobacco 
and other expensive luxuries, had amassed money enough 
to rest on his oars for all his after life. 



THE BARBER OF BANTRT. 163 

Other persons gave a different account of the manner in 
which Moynehan obtained his riches. This party seemed 
inclined to strike a medium between the supernatural and 
the common-place. Moynehan, they said, rented two or 
three small farms nearly adjoining that tract of mountain- 
land which subsequently became his estate. Neither 
providence nor settled and regular industry were amongst 
the qualities for which he was most remarkable. A man 
whose sole income was derived from his share in the 
profits of those small farms, he still maintained a style of 
living not surpassed by many who could boast of fee- 
simple patrimonies to support and palliate such ex- 
travagance. He kept a pack of hounds and a huntsman, 
and gave jovial entertainments to such of the neighbouring 
gentry as would condescend to accept his hospitality. His 
house was ever open ; a family piper lent his music to the 
dance of ruin ; there was nobody who did not look upon 
Moynehan as a paragon of good fellows, except his land- 
lord, and even he could scarcely find it in his heart to 
proceed to extremities with a person of so much spirit and 
goodnature. It is the fate of most goodnatnred spend- 
thrifts, however, to tire out in the end the forbearance of 
even their most forbearing friends, and Moynehan formed 
no exception to the general rule. After running six years 
in arrear of rent, he was thunderstruck by the intelligence 
that Sir David Hartigan was on the eve of visiting his 
property in the county, and of course would not leave Mr. 
Patrick Moynehan without a call. This was the signal 
for consternation. Ejectments and executions floated 
before the eyes of Moynehan ; and before he could collect 
even a moderate portion of the arrear last due, the baronet 
was on his way to his estate. It was (no uncommon case 
with Irish landowners, even at that period of home 
legislation) the first visit he had ever made to his paternal 
inheritance, and of this circumstance Moynehan determined 
to take advantage for his security. He called the tenants 



164 THE BARBER OF BANTRT. 

together, and harangued them in the most earnest mannef 
on the propriety of giving their landlord a suitable 
reception. 

*• 1 need not tell you all", he said, " that Sir David has 
been a good landlord to us all — [hurra ! hurra !] a mao 
that gives the poor man time for his money — [hurra !]— 
that never yet distressed* a tenant for his rent, nor bore 
hard on those that he knew to be well inclined if they had 
the means — [hurra! hurra!] — very well then, lads; you 
will remember that this is the first time he has ever shown 
himself amongst his tenants, aud let us take care that he 
has no cause to complain of his reception". 

A new volley of cordial " hurras " announced the ac- 
quiescence of the assembled tenants in this agreeable pro- 
posal, and preparations were immediately set on foot for 
receiving the baronet in the most splendid style. The 
demesnes and lawns of the small gentry within five miles 
rounil, were stripped of their fairest poplars and mountain 
ash, in order to form triumphal arches along the road 
which led to the village of * * * * *, where the great man 
was to reside during his stay. Hardy would have been 
the owner of a tapering fir or larch, who had dared to 
murmur at seeing his grounds invaded, and the pride of 
his shrubbery laid low for this festive purpose. The 
mothers, wives, and sisters of the cottiers lent their bright 
coloured shawls, ribands, and handkerchiefs, to flutter 
amid the foliage, and add new gaiety to the scene. There 
was one article of holiday spleudour in which there was no 
stint. A great portion of Sir David's estate consisting oi 
excellent bog, there was no lack of material for bonfires. 
Accordingly, at every cross road within half a mile round, 
and almost at every second cabin in the village itself, there 
was a pile of turf and bogwood, the contribution of 
the surrounding tenantry, ready for the torch the instant 
the carnage of the mountain so?ereign should appear. 

* Distrained. 



THE BARBER OF BANTRT. 165 

But what exceeded all beside, was the zeal exhibited by 
Mr. Patrick Moynehan himself, the instigator, in a great 
degree, of the whole proceeding, and who was moved to 
it, partly by real good-will towards his landlord, and in 
part by certain undefined hopes and impulses, which we 
will leave the knavish reader to divine. Before his door, 
upon the bare and level green, was piled a circle of turf, 
in the midst of which was suspended by machinery, which 
had taxed the ingenuity of the whole district, a prime ox, 
intended to be roasted whole. Besides this, were the 
lesser fires, at which pigs, turkeys, geese, and other 
inferior animals of culinary celebrity were prepared, each 
by the persons who had contributed both fire and meat. 

Above the gateway which led to this gala spot, was 
suspended a painted board, surrounded by green boughs, 
with, of course, what other inscription than " Cead millia 
faltha", executed in the best manuer that the village could 
afford. 

The day at length arrived, and the great man came. In 
consequence of his continual absenteeism, he had certain 
misgivings with respect to his popularity amongst his own 
tenantry, which made him wholly unprepared for the en- 
thusiastic reception with whicli he was now honoured. 
Within half a mile of the village, he was met by a pro- 
digious multitude of people, of both sexes, and of all 
ages, shouting, laughing, and capering for joy. Flutes, 
fiddles, bagpipes, and, in lieu of these, tin cans, dildorns, 
and every other implement from which any sound could be 
extracted that might bring the idea of music to the mind 
of the rudest hearer, added their obstreperous harmony to 
the general uproar. What need to pen our way through 
all the glories of the feast that followed ? Some idea may 
be formed of the enjoyment of the worthy baronet (who 
was amazingly fat), when we mention that lie was pla. ed 
from noon to evening of a broiling day in June, in the 
centre of be. ween thirty and forty huge fires, the smoke of 



166 . THE BARBER OF BANTRT. 

which, settling low, in consequence of the calm and the 
tenuity of the mountain air, had well nigh stifled him ; that 
in addition to this, he had to dance (according to in- 
dispensable custom) with almost all the young women in 
the place ; besides other duties of courtesy, so oppressive, 
that he was afterwards heard to declare, that he had 
almost as lief be a king, and go through all the labour of 
a levee or drawing-room, as to spend such another day at 
*****. In addition to this, when it is remembered that 
the gates were thrown open, and free admission given to 
all travellers, comprising the numerous beggars, whom the 
foregone fame of the feast had drawn together from the 
distant parishes, it must be acknowledged that the situation 
of the excellent Baronet was truly enviable. At all 
events, he could not choose but feel the deepest gratitude 
to Mr. Moynehan, at whose house he spent the ensuing 
fortnight. The latter, however, seemed to think the glory 
sufficient for his landlord, for by some means or other Sir 
David never could find an opportunity of engaging him in 
any serious conversation on the subject of his rent. If 
he spoke of money, Moynehan talked of woodcocks, — if 
he mentioned arrears, Moynehan could show him the 
prettiest fly-fishing in Ireland, — or he had a present of 
gray-hounds of the genuine old Irish stock, — known 
relatives of those that were presented by Sir Somebody to 
the Great Mogul, — or he insisted on his accepting a 
beautiful mare of the most unblemished pedigree, — any- 
thing — everything he was ready to furnish him with 
except the needful. And the issue was, that Sir David 
returned to Dublin, looking upon Moynehan as one of the 
most generous fellows and the most impracticable tenants 
in the world. 

However, such a state of things could not continue. 
Year followed year, threat came on threat, and ruin 
showed her hideous countenance at length in the shape 
of a formal ejectment from his holding. He might still 



THE BAr.BKR OF BANTBY. 167 

(ouch were the times) have set the law at bay, and 
maintained possession for some years longer at least; but 
this he would not do. He must give up his farm, and the 
thought filled him with the deepest melancholy. At table, 
the huntsman cracked his joke in vain (for the huntsman, 
it should be understood, was a man of sufficient importance 
to occupy a small side table in the common dining room, 
aud after dinner to take his seat by the ample fireside). 
It signified little that it was the same irresistible joke, or 
the same admirable anecdote which had shook his sides with 
laughter regularly once a day for half a score years before. 
He now listened to it with a vacant eye, aud a countenance 
that plainly showed how far his thoughts were out of 
hearing. 

What was to be done? Was he to bid farewell to his 
numerous domestics, and to tell his huntsman that he was to 
hunt no more for him, and to sell or give away the hounds, 
and to resign his flies and fishing-tackle, and to watch no 
more the beautiful motion of his gray hounds as they shot 
like ghosts across the mountain heath in March ? The 
thought was dreadful. He wandered like a solitary 
being by the river side, and along the hedges which en- 
closed his lawn and paddock, and seemed to feel aheady the 
pressure of the abject poverty to which he must soon be 
reduced. 

Amid all the faults which he now so bitterly regretted, 
ff not for a better motive, yet for the ruin they had brought 
upon himself, there was one feature in his past conduct 
whick he called to mind with pleasure. He never in a 
single instance had refused assistance to a fellow-creature 
in distress. No matter who the individual, how indifferent 
the character, or what his own circumstances at the 
moment, he never had withheld his aid where it was 
wanted. No consideration of inconvenience to himself, 
no diead of theft or lack of means in his own household, 
prevented his affording to every individual, without ex? 



168 THE BARRER OF BANTRT. 

ception, high or low, great or little, who chose to apply 
for it, a comfortable dinner and a night's lodging beneath 
his roof. This indiscriminate charity, it is said, was not 
wholly in accordance with the views of Mrs. Moynehan, 
whose wardrobe and fowl-house had often suffered for her 
husband's hospitality, but he would hear nothing of her 
complaints. Giving was with him the easiest of all duties, 
and as there were some others to which he did not 
attend so closely, he seemed determined to practise this 
in its perfection. The greater the loss and the greater 
the inconvenience, he thought the greater the merit also ; 
and he had an idea, that what is bestowed in this way is 
not lost, but that merciful actions, beyond all others 
whatsoever, buoy np the spirit at the hour of death and 
after. 

In his arguments with Mrs. Moynehan upon this subject, 
he was in the habit of relating an anecdote for her 
edification, which we will transcribe for that of the reader. 

"There were two brothers, twin-brothers", he said, 
"who were so fervently attached, that each made the 
other promise, in case lie should die first, to return, if 
possible, and let the survivor know how he had fared in 

* That undiscovered country from whose bourne 
No traveller returns*. 

Both, however, had passed the meridian of life without 
meeting any serious illness, and both forgot a compact 
which they had made in their youth, and which was blotted 
from their memory by the cares of manhood and the new 
engagements in which matrimony had involved them. On 
a sudden one of them was stunned by the intelligence 
that his brother had died of that species of brain fever 
called a coup de soleil. The news filled him with grief. 
In the evening he walked out to indulge his sorrow in a 
neighbouring church-yard, and to relieve his mind by 
prayer. While thus occupied, an oppressive sense of some 



THE BARBER OF BANTRY. 169 

extraordinary presence fell upon his mind. He looked 
np — his brother stood before him. His first feeling was an 
emotion of ecstacy at the thought that the rumour of his 
brother's death was false, and he ran to cast himself upon 
his neck. But as he proceeded, the other retired, and 
always, to his extreme astonishment, preserved exactly 
the same distance at which he had at first beheld him. 

"'Why do you not speak to me?' said the surviving 
brother ; * they told me you were dead, and that we should 
meet no more'. 

"'Brother', said the figure, in an unearthly voice, 'do 
you forget the agreement which we made near this spot 
exactly twenty-five years since ?' 

"The hearer instantly understood the whole, and that 
it was his brother's shade which he beheld. He trembled, 
and a cold moisture settled on his forehead. 

" ' I am allowed to come back', says he, { for your 
warning and for your consolation. Immediately after my 
death, I found myself in the finest country I ever saw in 
my life, with the richest demesnes and grandest houses 
that ever were found, and milb'ons of people walking 
amongst the tiees, and talking and laughing together, as 
happy as the day is long. To my great surprise, I found 
that almost all the ladies and gentlemen that owned the 
fine houses were people that I remembered in this world 
as poor beggars, and religious Christians, and persons of 
that kind, that nobody cares about. I went from one to 
another, but not one of them knew me, and the man that 
had the charge of the place was going to turn me out, 
when one of the gentlemen called to him and said ho 
knew me. I looked close at him, and at last remembered 
the face of a poor blind man whom I had guided once on 
a stormy night from a neighbouring village to his own 
door; but he had now a pair of eyes as blight as stars. 
That was the only act of real charity I ever recollected to 
have done in my life, and it was thj means of getting mo 

8 



170 THE BARBER OF BANTBT. 

a handsome hou.© anil garden, where I live happier than 
I can describe' ". 

A celebrated Greek critic tells us that if we separate the 
sublime from the allegorical, we shall often strip it of half 
its excellence. If the axiom be applied in the case of 
Moynehan's legend, even polished readers may find it not 
wholly without meaning. From the fact, however, that 
Mr. Moynehan was in the habit of repeating it for the im- 
provement of his lady, it may be inferred that it had 
not all the influence upon her conduct which he could 
desire. 



CHAPTER II. 



A few evenings previous to the day on which he, Moy- 
nehan, was to give up possession of his house and lands, a 
storm arose so terrible that it seemed doubtful whether the 
building would survive the ownership of its present 
master. The wind came howling and shrieking up the un- 
sheltered heath, and through the close ravines in the 
neighbourhood. Now it shook the window frames as if in 
sudden passion at their obstinate resistance to its fury, now 
it hissed and roared against the well-bound thatch — and 
now wound its dismal horn in the lofty chimney-top. Mr. 
Moynehan sat by his parlour-fire, comparing his past with 
what must, in all probability, be his future style of living, 
aud the contrast was almost too much for his philosophy. 
Suddenly the voice of Mrs. Moynehan, raised high in ob- 
jurgation in the kitchen, attracted his attention. Half 
opening the parlour door, he paused to ascertain the cause 
of sounds " not unfamiliar to his ear". 

"Out of my house — pack — out of my house this 
instant", exclaimed the lady, in a voice scarce a note of 
v. Inch was lower than C above the fifth over line. " It 



THE BARBER OF BANTRT. 171 

was yon, and the like of you, that brought ruin to our 
dooj, — pack out!" 

A shrill and querulous murmur was heard in answer. 

" The storm !" continued Mrs. Moynehau ; " it is uo 
matter for the storm. As well as you found your way 
here, find your way back, for here you shall not stay an 
hour. Do you hear me talking to you ? Quit my house 
this instant. Aye — cough, cough — I dare say you know 
how to do more than that when it serves your turn. 
Out— pack at once!" 

At this instant Mr. Moyneban entered the kitchen, 
where he beheld a sight that rilled him with indigna- 
tion against the cruelty of his helpmate. An old man, 
shaking with palsy, and so worn down by age and its in- 
firmities that it seemed as if his years could scarcely 
number less than a century, was standing on the well- 
flagged kitchen floor, and gazing on the stout and portly 
Mrs. M. with a deprecating attitude. It would be diffi- 
cult to conceive a more complete picture of misery than 
the old mau presented. A long staff, half again as high 
as its possessor, and held in both hands, seemed all that 
enabled him to keep his feet ; his knees, his hands, his 
head, his whole frame shook violently with his disease, so 
that, had his features been less strongly marked, it would 
be difficult to gather their expression in the continual and 
rapid motion. His dress was ragged in the extreme, and 
so patched that it seemed as if he never had been thq 
master of another suit. In addition to this, he had been 
already drenched in rain from head to foot, and his long 
white hair and the hanging fritters of his garment, still 
dripped as if he were about to dissolve away upon the 
floor, while his face, which looked as if the loose skin had 
been drawn over without being attached to the fleshless 
bones, was glistening with rain, and haggard with fear, at 
the prospect of being again exposed to the horrors of the 
storm. Moynehau could not help thinking, however, as he 



172 THE BAKBER OF BANTBT. 

looked on the old man, that his terror seemed excessive for 
the occasion, and that his manner resembled that of one 
who feared some danger of a still more appalling kind 
than any which the storm could bring. 

"Will you — turn out — the — poor old man in — the 
storm an' all ? " he gasped forth word after word at long 
intervals, and with gestures of the most agonizing terror. 
" Give me a night's — lodg — in' an' I'll pray for — you 

for — ever an' — ever. Don't send me out to the robb 

storm, I mane". 

" To the robbers ? what robbers ? What robbers do you 

expect to meet in ? and if it was full of them, 

what have you to lose by robbers ? eh ?" 

"Did I — say — robbers, a-gra?" said the old man— 
" don't mind me — I'm an ould fool that hasn't any sense. 
Sure enough, what robbing could they have upon me; a 
poor ould beggar that has nothin' only what rags is 
coverin' my ould bones — nothin' in life — nothin' — Ayeh 
— robbers — I don't know what I'm sayin' with the dint o' 
fear ; but won't you, like a good Christian, gi' me a night's 
lodgin' — anywhere — upon these bare flags — I'm aisy, so 

as the robb so as I'd have the roof betune me an' — 

an' the clouds to-night, — an' may the Heavens be your 
'■)ed hereafter'*. 

"She will — she will — come in and sit by the fire", 
exclaimed Moynehan, interposing just as his lady had 
opened her lips to give vent to a fresh volley of reproaches. 
" Get supper ready for that poor man ", he added, to a 
servant — k ' and you, my dear, will not even affliction itself 
teach you to pity the afflicted ? you don't know how 
long we may have a house ourselves ". 

" I know how long we're to have this house ", answered 
Mrs. Moynehan, in a low growling tone, like that of an 
over zealous watch-dog, which has received a reprimand 
from its master for oliering a too obstinate resistance to 
the entrance of a peaceable stranger. 



THE BAKBER OF BANTRY. 173 

** Yon don't know that neither", said Moynehan, " and 
no matter it* it shonld be ours for no longer than an hour, I 
tm determined to make a free use of it while it belongs to 
me. Walk in, good fellow ". 

The poor man, clapping his hands together, and mut- 
tering blessings, staggered forward to the fire-place, still 
casting a timid eye askance at the lady, as if he could 
have answered in the language of poor Buff— 

u I dare not, sir, 
For fear of your cur ". 

Mr. Moynehan having seen the beggar comfortably 
established by the fire-side, returned to the parlour. 
Here he began to meditate upon the difference between 
his own condition and that of the poor mendicant, and 
found so much that was preferable in the former that he 
began to recover his spirits. 

"At the worst, my dear", said he, addressing Mrs. 
Moynehan, " we are not so badly off as that poor fellow. 
We will still have many friends, and we will not, in all 
probability, be without a house of some kind or another, 
and at all events we have each of us a decent suit of 
clothes, which is more than can be said for him. So that 
'tis a great comfort to think our case is not so bad but 
that it might be worse ". 

Before Mrs. Moynehan could reply, the parlour-door 
was opened, and a face, distinguished by a gaping mouth 
and a pair of staring eyes, appeared at the aperture. It 
was that of Rick or Rickhard Lillis, the faithful groom and 
valet (not to mention fifty other offices which he filled 
with equal fidelity and skill) of Mr. Moynehan. He 
remained for a time in the same position, gaping and 
gazing as if, like a ghost, he could not speak until some 
living being had addressed him. 

44 Well, Rick, what ails you now ?" 

44 The poor man, sir !" 



174 THE BARBER OF BANTBT. 

"What of him?" 

"He wants the priest, sir; I'm in dhread bVs dyin'". 

" Phoo, nonsense !" exclaimed Mr. Moynehan, snatching 
a light and hurrying from the room. Strange as it 
seemed, he found his servant's story true. The old beggar 
was lying in the kitchen, on the straw pallet which had 
been prepared for him, and gasping, as it appeared, 
almost in the agonies of death. By this the storm had 
in some degree abated, and Moynehan ordered Kick Lillis 
to tie a collar on the head of the working mare, and ride 
otF at once for the clergyman and the neighbouring doc- 
tor. When both those functionaries had left the house 
(which was not for a few hours) he paid another visit to 
his miserable guest. The old man was lying on his back 
in a feeble condition, and still muttering some incoherent 

sentences about " robbers " and " down the glen of B " 

and of " the storm ", and " his own cabin in the west ". 
On hearing Mr. Moynehan's voice, he looked fixedly upon 
him, and seemed making an effort to collect his scattered 
reason. 

" You will have no raison, sir ", he said, " to repent 
your charity to me. The docthor tells me I can't live ; 
so I must only see and make use o' the time that's left me. 

" 1 was born westwards, near Dingle. My father 
thought to make a scholar of me, but from a child I never 
could take to the book. Neither birch nor masther could 
ever get any good o' me. No one could equal me for 
michin from school, and while I was there, I'd be at any- 
thing but the learnin'. So one day, afther a'most breakin' 
his heart to thry an' get good o' me, my father kem' out, 
an' he havin' a book in one hand and a spade in the 
other. 

" ' Here, Tom', says he, ' take your choice between 
these ; if you choose the book, you may become a counsellor 
one time or other — if you take the spade, you'll die as yon 
beeau \ 



THE BARBER OF BANTRT. 175 

" I looked this way and that, and afther considherin' 
tor a while, I took the spade. My father left me nothin' 
else, bnt I thought it enough, for I didn't know what it 
was to have more. I was light and happy ; my conscience 
ga' me no throuble, an' I had no sort o' care upon my 
mind. 

" Well, of a day, a burnin' day in June (I remember 
it well — it was the worst day to me that ever came ont of 
the skies) — of a little St. John's eve, I was making a 
drain to clear a bog belongin' to a gentleman that used 
to gi' me work. I ought to think o' that day well, an' so 
I do, an' often did before. It was a fine bright day, 
but it darkened my mind for ever afther. The sun was 
shinin' all around, the birds were singin' in the little bushes, 
the cuckoo was cooin' at a distance in the wood, an' the 
young foals were gallopin' about upon the green fields like 
kittens at play. Twas a fine day to man an' beast, but 
'twas a woful day to me. It was just then, as I was 
whistling an working in the thrench, I threw up somethiir 
upon the bank that sounded as it hit agin' a stone. I 
took it up an' looked at it. It was like a collar that 
would be round a person's neck, an' I was told afther- 
wards, that it was a kind o' collar the ould Irish knights 
or kings, or people o' that sort, used to wear as an 
ornament in former times. I scraped it a little, an' it was 
yellow inside ; I took it to the docthor that lived in the 
same place, to see could he make anything of it. He 
dipped the top of a quill in a little bottle he had, an' 
touched it where I scraped it, an' afther lookin' at it 
again, he wiped it an' handed it back to me, an' tould me 
it was raal goold. 

* Until that time the thoughts o' riches, nor money, nor 
anything o' the kind ever ga' me a day's unaisiness. I 
had my hire from one day to another, an* I had health, an' 
I cared for no more. But the minute he toald me it was 
raal gool j, I felt as if my whole mind was changed within 



176 THE BARBER OF BANTRT. 

me at once ; I took home the goold, an' put it under my 
head that night an' slep' upon it, an' in the mornin' I went 
off to town, where I took it through all the gooldsmifhs' 
shops to see what they'd gi' me for it, and I sould it at last 
for seven pounds, which was twelve times more money 
than ever I had in my life before. From that day out, I 
never knew an hour's pace o' mind ; and for eighty-seven 
years afther, that's to this present time, my whole end and 
aim was to add as much as I could to the price of what I 
found. I stinted my food, I stinted my clothin' ; I never 
laid out as much as one ha'penny in sport. I never yet 
since that day, gave so much as one farthin' to a fellow 
crathur — an' now I must part it all". 

Here the unfortunate old man heaved a deep groan, and 
his ghastly eyes rolled in their sockets with the agony. 

" Bring witnesses if you have 'em", said he, in a feeble 
tone, " so that the law can't come between my words and 
their meaning afther I am gone". 

Mr. Moynehan complied, and summoned Rick Lillis and 
another servant to the mendicant's bedside. 

" Ye are witnesses", said the old man, faintly, " that 
out o' thanks to this gentleman for his charity to me, an' 
having no kith nor kindred o' my own, an' bein' sure he'll 
make a betther use o' what I have, than any body else I 
know, I lave him my outside coat an' its contents, an' all I 
have in the world besides**. 

The servants then retired, and the mendicant, taking a 
small and rusty key from his bosom, where it was tied fast 
with a piece of hempen twine, handed it to Moynehan, and 
said: 

" There's a small cabin without a stick o' furniture, on 
the side of a hill by the ould bridge near Dingle. Any 
body will tell you where Garret Casey, the miser, lives 
when he's at home. There's a padlock on the doore, an' 
this is the key of it. Whisper hether. When I'm gone, 
go to that house, an' search iu the corner near the cup- 



TFE BARBER OF BANTRY. 177 

board in the inuer room, an' rise up a brick that's there, 
an* have what's undher it — but — but — not till I'm gone, 
you know", the old man added, with a sudden expression 
of alarm ; " the mother never loved her child, nor the wife 
her husband, nor the glutton his food, nor the drunkard his 
glass, as I loved what's undher that stone ; an' what good 
is it for me now ? I fasted for it — I watched for it — I 
hungered and thirsted for it — and I bore the heat and the 
cold, an' thought nothing of any kind o' labour that could 
add the smallest trifle to it ; an' now I must part it all. If 
I suffered as much for my sin?, this would be a happy 
night to me. Many a mile I walked barefoot on many a 
8inty road, to add a little to it ; an' all for you. If I 
loved the law o' God as well as I loved what's undher that 
brick, what a saint I'd be to night". 

Soon after he began to rave in a distracted manner 
about robbers, and felt for his key, and missing it, burst, 
into feeble lamentations, and complained that he was un- 
( one, and that bis house was plundered. Before morning 
he expired, after recovering his reason sufficiently to 
request that his remains might be conveyed to his own 
parish. On examining his garments, they were found 
quilted with coins of eveiy description, from gold to 
bumble copper; guineas, dollars, shillings, pence, and 
halfpence, being stitched in indiscriminately between the 
lining and the cloth, to the amount of more than thirty 
pounds. 

Mr. Moynehan complied with the last wishes of the 
dying man. He had the remains conveyed to the men- 
dicant's native parish, and having found the cabin, waited 
until night in order to examine it. He then went, 
accompanied by Rick Lillis, and bearing a dark lantern in 
his hand, to the miser's wretched dwelling. It was a 
hovel of the very vilest kind. A round stone near the 
chimney corner served for a seat. There was no ap- 
pearance of firing, no ashes on the hearth, nor even the 



178 THE BARBER OF BANTRT. 

least indication that any such luxury had brightened the 
lonely spot for years before. By the light of the lantern, 
Moynehan searched the gloomy little inner room which 
was partitioned off by a hurdle rudely smeared with clay. 
He found the brick and raised it. After clearing away a 
quantity of loose earth, he found a bag of tanned calf- 
skin, which, by its weight and bulk, he judged to be the 
treasure sought. It was nearly filled with gold, far more 
at the first glance than would be sufficient to relieve the 
legatee from all his difficulties. 

When they had returned to the small inn at which 
they slept, Moynehan charged his servant to say nothing 
whatsoever when they should reach home of their good 
fortune, judging of course that he might safely leave it to 
his own discretion to keep silence while they were still in a 
strange place. Rick Lillis could not for a long time find 
any form of expression in which to convey an idea of the 
extraordinary thoughts that filled his mind since the com- 
pletion of this adventure. He remained sauntering from 
corner to corner of the room in which his master sat 
quietly musing by the fire-side, now looking down at his 
feet, now directly up at the ceiling, now at every corner 
above, and anon successively at every corner below, as 
if he were looking out in all directions fur suitable 
expressions. 

" Well, there's no use in talking, master, but this day 
flogged Ireland. See, for all, how 'tis no way foolish to 
do a good turn to high or low. W T hy then, I remember 
of a time, my father tellin' me (rest his sowl !) of a thing 
o' the kind that happened a first cousin of his own, one 
Brien Sheehy, that lived estwards in the hills o' Knock- 
aderry. He was a very stupid man, sir, with submission 
to you, an' hadn't as much sense as would carry him from 
this to the bedpost ; but he bad a wife that was just as 
'cute as he was foolish, an* many's the time he'd be lost 
only for her. Well, 'tis innocent people, they say, mostly 



THB BAJRBER OF BANTBY. 179 

pets the luck. Of a day Brien found a handful o' money 
in a field, where he was diggin', an' nobody lookiu' at him 
the same time, so he went an' hid it in a ditch, makin' a 
hole for it with his spade, until he'd come an' take it away 
when it would be his convenience. Well, sir, he went 
home and tould his wife what he found. ' You done some 
good at last', says she; 'where's the money?' 'Oh, I 
have it a-hide', says he, 'in the field where I got it'. 

* Well an' good', says the wife ; ' I hope you have a mark 
upon it, the way you'll find it again ; an' not to be like 
Pat Piercy, the cobbler, that hid his tools so well that he 
never could find 'cm afther'. ' Oh, I'll find it asy enough', 
says Brien ; ' for I took a fine big mark for it', says he, 

* a gray horse that was feedin' a-near the place when I put 
it a-hide'. Well, the wife gev one screech that you'd hear 
a mile off. ' Oh, murther 1 you born omodhaun', says 
she ; ' sure the horse was no mark for you to take. Sure 
he'll lave that to go elsewhere', says she, * an then what'll 
become o' your mark ? 'Twas an evil day', says she, I 
ever had anything to say to you ; an' you'll bring us to 
beggary at last'. Well, poor Brien stood as if you shot 
him ; an' then he darted out the doores, an' run for the 
bare life to the field where he left the money. An' sure 
enough the horse was clane at a conthrairy side o' the 
field. Poor Brien clapped his hands to his head, and was 
fit to be tied at the thoughts of it ; but it was no u^e for 
him. He sarched the whole field ; but he might just as 
well be lookin' for lobsters in the same place. 

" Well, sir, as he was walkin' a few weeks afther on 
the high road, comin' from market, he met an ould beggar- 
man that axed him for an alms. ' Don't be talkin' to me, 
man', says Brien. ' I lost more money a month ago, than 
1*11 ever have in my life again ; but here's one penny for 
you any way*. 'Where did you lose it?' says the poor 
roan. ' I lost it in such a field, where I had it a-hide in 
a ditch', says he. ' Well', says the beggar, ' one good turn 



180 THE BARBEH OP BANTRT. 

desarves another. If you'll step acrass the field, to Paul 
Rahilly's, you'll hear somethin' of it', says he : *I turned 
in the boreen, 'while ago, au' I heard them talkin' of a 
power o' money the childher found in a ditch, as they were 
playin". Well, sir, sure enough, he went acrass to 
Rahilly's, an', 1 declare, he got the money again. The 
Rahilly's were very honest people; an' the first token he 
gev 'era o' the money bein' his, I'll engage they handed 
it over to him. So that even a poor beggar might have it 

in his . Sonuhar to me", added Rick, as a ioud, 

sound, resembling the noise of a penny trumpet, cut short 
the moral of his tale. " Sonuhar* to me, but he's fast 
asleep the whole time, an' I, like a fool, tellin' my story 
to the four walls. Well, an' some walls have ears, they 
say, an' why shouldn't I ? The masther is a made man, 
any way, that's plain enough". 



CHAPTER IIL 

It will be recollected that we do not relate the above as % 
fact of which we have historical knowledge; but as one of 
the explanations rumour gave of the way in which Mr. 
Moynehan had obtained his sudden wealth. His secret 
was kept, and the day of sale arrived. An auctioneer 
from Liniirick attended to put up the household furniture 
and other articles to the highest bidder. Many, however, 
said it was folly to talk, that there would be no bidders 
at all, the Moynehans were so hospitable, and so well 
liked throughout the country. Though the morning was 
rainy, it did not prevent great crowds from attending, 
and to the great astonishment of the whole world, 
biddings were just as smart as if Mr. Moynehan 
were a perfect stranger. There was one circumstance, 
* A good wife, or husband. 



THE BARBER OP BANTRT. 181 

however, which occasioned universal amazement in the 
crowd. 

Mr. Moynehan had taken liis seat next the auctioneer, 
his hands resting on his walking cane, and his eyes fixed 
upon the various bidders, as if to be satisfied by ocular 
demonstration of the identity of the individuals who were 
now pouncing like hawks upon the spoils of the mansion, 
which had been for near a score of years as free to their 
use as to his own. The auction was about to commence, 
when in strutted Rick Lillis, with the air of a nobleman, 
and took his place amongst the aristocratic purchasers. 

" Give me a chair, here !" he cried aloud, in a voice 
like thunder. 

Three or four servants flew to execute his orders, and 
he placed himself in the seat with an air of surly dignity, 
as if he wished to see who would presume to meddle with 
him. The gentlemen and ladies around him began to 
whisper, and gather their brows, and seemed not al- 
together to like it, but Rick maintained his place un- 
moved. 

" Gi' me a bottle o' wine !" he called aloud, in the same 
tone— "an' a glass for dhrinkin', an' a crust o' bread". 

Again half a dozen attendants flew to execute hia 
wishes with the same alacrity as before. 

"That'll do", said Rick; "now, Misther Auctioneer, 
you can commence business: I'm quite ready". 

The auctioneer bowed low with mock gravity, and pro- 
ceeded to put up the articles of furniture in succession. 
Nothing could be more painful to Mr. Moynehan's friends 
than to bid at all ; bu" as the articles were going, each 
thought he might as well have them as another. What 
was their astonishment, however, when Rick Lillis bid for 
every lot just as it was about to be knocked down to 
another ! Lot after lot, there was nothing too high nor 
too low for him ; and he paid for every article in sterling 
gold upon the instant. Every article, without exception, 



182 THE BARBER OF BANTRT. 

not a stick of furniture, nor of anything else, was carried 
out by a stranger. The bidders now began to turn the 
tables upon Rick, and many said that he was an un- 
grateful fellow, after having been able to save so much 
money through the liberality of his master, to make so 
thankless an use of it at the close. However, amid all 
this generous zeal for the ruined Moynehan, none of the 
jovial companions and old friends seemed to think of 
asking him to his house, but, one after another, they 
dropped away, and left him to confer alone with hia 
calamity. 

Mr. Moynehan made no effort to retain his farms, but 
settled honourably with his landlord. He then made the 
purchase long since spoken of, and began to build the 
house, the ruins of which have been described at the com- 
mencement of our narrative. It would be a vain attempt 
to paint the consternation which was excited throughout 
the country side by the news that Moynehan had pur- 
chased an estate, nor the celerity with which he had all 
his friends about him once again, as officious and as 
cordial as ever. The mystery of Rick Lillis's extra- 
ordinary wealth became clear when they found the 
furniture of the old house appropriated to its accustomed 
uses in the new. 

Mr. Moynehan, however, did not reproach his old 
neighbours with their ingratitude. 

" How would I be the gainer, my dear", he would say 
to his indignant helpmate, on perceiving her anger rise at 
the approach of any of those worthy adherents, " how 
would I be the gainer by declaring war against all my 
neighbours, because they are not just the kind of people 
I would have them?— If I were to wait for friends until 
I should find them without fault, I might live to the age 
of Methusalem without finding as much as would make a 
hand at whist, and Duuiby one of the party too. Sure 
'tis the very fault I have to find with myself, that I'm not 



THE BARBER OF BA.NTRY. 183 

Just as I'd like to be. And, poor people ! if they have 
acted wrong, they will suffer enough for it hereafter, 
without my endeavouring to make them uncomfortable at 
present". 

Accordingly, there was no one who was not invited to 
the Housewarraing. Now, if any uninitiated reader should 
desire to kno \ what an Irish Housewarming was in the 
days of Mr. Moynehan, he must be content with our brief 
description, seeing that no such entertainment is to be 
found amongst the extravagancies of the present day. 
The period was a century too late for the muse of Derrick, 
and a century too early for the bard of Ballyporeen, or we 
would have considered it unnecessary to say more than 
that a Housewarming had been given. 

" Rick !" Mr. Moynehan exclaimed from the bed-room, 
where he was occupied in an operation from which half the 
human race are happily exempt — we mean that of 
shaving — " Rick !" exclaimed Mr. Moynehan. 

" Goin', masther !" The reader must understand that 
Rick Lillis generally said going, when he meant coming. 
" Goin', masther !" answered Rick, and his gaping mouth 
and staring eyes were presently visible at the chamber 
door. 

" Rick, do yon know that I am to give a Housewarming 
on Thursday next?" 

" Oyeh, iss, sir — long life to yon. The missez tould vn 
ovit". 

" Well, Rick, you know we shall want music, go I leave 
that part of tlve affair to your management". 

" Ullilu ! me, sir !" exclaimed Rick, in modest alarm. 
" Sorrow tune did I ever play in my life upon anything, 
except in' it was a little taste upon the jew's-harp, an' I'm 
Bure it is aisily known that wouldn't go far among a whole 
housefull". 

" You mistake me, Rick ; I have as little inclination to 
listen to your music as you can have to furnish it. But I 



184 THE BAKBKR OF BANTRY. 

mean that you shall find musicians ; so mind what I tell 
you : if I find that there is a man within three baronies 
round us, that ever drew horsehair across catgut, or ever 
danced the chanter of a bagpipe on his knee, or ever 
whistled God save the King upon a pipolo, who shall not 
be at the Housewanning on Thursday next — I'll — no I 
can't hang you — ah, joy be with the times when I could — 
before we ever had a law to interfere with us— but I'll be 
tempted to go as near it as I can". 

<k Long life to your honour, sure I'll do my best". 

" Take no excuse, as you value your head". 

" Excuse !" exclaimed Rick, with a half shout of sur- 
prise; "I'll go bail, I'll make 'em come jumpin', an' glad 
to be axed — I'll take my hazel stick in my hand, an' I'd 
like to see the man among 'era that would daar say ' no' 
to me, when I give the commands". 

He left the room, and so punctually did he fulfil his 
commission, that on the Thursday following a troop of 
fiddlers, fifers, pipers, and other musicians, of all ages, and 
of both sexes, had assembled at the new edifice, sufficient 
of themselves to have constituted a numerous company. 
But they were soon lost in the multitudes that followed. 
Cars, horses, truckles (furnished with a bed-tick, to supply 
the lack of springs and cushion), every species of vehicle, 
and every beast of burden that the land afforded, were put 
in requisition by the numerous guests who came with un- 
blushing countenances to claim a share of Moynehan's 
returning hospitality. Nor did he treat them to Timou's 
feast of " smoke and lukewarm water". Moynehan never 
expected much gratitude from his friends, so he was not 
disappointed when he did not receive it. It was in 
compliance with the promptings of his own heart, and not 
in the wild-goose-chase of human gratitude, that he waa 
either hospitable or generous ; so he felt no indignation at 
being denied what he had never sought. Indeed, it is 
most probable that if he had heard the story of Timon of 



THE BARBER OF BANTRT. 185 

Athena, he would have thought him a selfish fellow, who * 
precisely met with his desert for affecting the name of 
generosity, when in reality he gave nothing for which he 
did not both expect and demand a return ; and an exqui- 
site temper he manifested, too, when he made that wonder- 
ful discovery, that it is not quite so easy to borrow as it ia 
to lend in this world. No : " uncover, dogs, and lap", was 
not the welcome Moynehan gave his guests, but such a 
banquet that it was " given up to it", such a " giving 
out" was never known before in that side of the country, 
any way. And he had the satisfaction, too, of finding 
that it was all a mistake about the ingratitude of his 
neighbours ; for there was scarcely an individual amongst 
them that did not before morning take an opportunity of 
assuring their host, that all he had in the world was at 
his service, and his life, if he wanted it, into the bargain ; 
a fact which shows how erroneous was the evil opinion 
entertained of them by Mrs. Moynehan, and how cautious 
we ought to be of judging by appearances. 
And so the house was built and warmed. 



CHAPTER IV. 



During the life-time, or, as the peasantry on his estate 
termed it, the " reign" of Mr. Moynehan, the affairs of 
Tipsy Hall, as he named his new residence, " for raisons", 
were managed with tolerable moderation. We have ma- 
terial enough to dwell at ample length on the subsequent 
history of the edifice, before it came into the hands of the 
individual whose earthly destinies were most intimately 
interwoven with the subject of our tale. We might de- 
scribe the feasting, the drinking, and, unhappily for the 
credit of a portion of our ancestry, the duelling, the cock- 
fighting, the horse-racing, the dissipation of every kind of 
which it was once the scene ; and some readers might find 



186 THE BARBRR OF BANTRT. 

80 faithful a detail of manners, now, happily, almost for- 
gotten, not wholly destitute of interest. We might dwell 
upou the unheard-of magnificence displayed at the funeral 
of the first Moynehau, who chose to be interred at his 
birth-place, which was " far up in the north", in the 
county of Donegal. We might follow the sable vehicle 
for eighteen days along the wild and varied road, attended 
as it was the whole way by near one thousand persons. 
We might describe the storm of rain that, for three long 
days, pouring down incessantly upon the mournful train, 
added unexpected dreariness and discomfort to a task 
already full of gloom and woe ; we might tell (for the 
sources from which we draw our information faithfully 
record the number) how many, dying on the wayside of 
cold and of fatigue, how many, in a sudden feud arising 
between two hostile factions, who were included iu the train, 
had given this testimony of their fidelity and zeal to the 
manes of their benefactor. For a whole day, it was said, the 
coffin halted in its progress, until this controversy was de- 
cided, and then the whole proceeded in the same order as 
before. We might dilate yet further on the extravagancies 
of the more unbridled spirits who succeeded the founder of 
the mansion in his possessions, and on the wilder orgies with 
which they made its walls reecho through many a winter 
night. But we write to illustrate, not to satirise, human 
nature ; and it is possible that if we were to transcribe all 
that is preserved amongst the neighbouring peasantry of 
the history of the ruin, the reader might hardly thank us 
for our preciseness. Add to this, that we must confess, 
at the risk of losing no matter how many of our readers, 
the subject has for us but little attraction. Boisterous, 
quarrelsome manners, habitual excesses, the manners, in 
a word, of the drinking table, have for us, whether in life 
or on paper, but little charm, even when dashed with 
gaiety and wit, and made interesting by personal daring 
and adventure. Our ancestors had their follies — we have 



THE BARBER OF BANTRT. 187 

ours ; and it is rather hard that we should laugh at their 
manners, when they have not the opportunity of returning 
the compliment. 

We shall, therefore, suffer this portion of our history to 
be gathered from the lips of no less a personage than Rick 
Lillis himself, as, an old and crutch-borne man, he 3tood 
amongst the ruins of the building on a summer day, de- 
tailing with melancholy interest, to an inquisitive tourist, 
the fortunes of the family he had survived. 

" There was somethin' wrong about the house, sir, ever 
from the very big'nin'. The dhrollest* nizes ever you 
seen, used to be hard about the place at night, every day, 
from the time the first stone was laid, until the roof an' 
all came down. In the dead o' the night time the people 
used to be called out o' their sleep by sthrange voices, and 
they never could find out who it was that called 'em. It 
bate all ever you hear. For a time after the ould mas- 
ther's death (rest his sowl ! ) there was no standin' the 
place at all, with the stories they all had, that he used to 
be seen risin' — himself an' the ould bucogh, that it was 
known afther left him all the money. Sometimes they 
used to be seen walkin' together, lock-arms, in the moon- 
shine ; more times, they say, when the family would be 
sittin' by the fireside, talkin', an' no light in the place only 
the blaze o' the fire, they'd hear the doors open, an' they'd 
look back this way over their shoulders, an' there they'd 
see old Moynehan with his grave-clothes about him, 
lookiu' in upon 'em. liut there's one thing I was, as I 
may say, present at myself, an' 'tis as thrue as you're 
6tandin' there. 

" You don't know, may be, the dizaze the ould masther 
died of? Asy, an' I'll tell you. It was what they call a 
stomach-wolf. He was out of a day in harvest with the 
men, an' bein' rather hot, an' the fresh hay convanient, 
be sat down upon a cock of it, an' fell asleep. Well, be 

* Strangest. 



188 THE BARBER OF BANTRT. 

knew nothin' of it, but it is then the rogue of a wolf took 
an advantage of him to get into his mouth, so 'cute, an' 
down his throath, an' into the stomach snug an' warm, an' 
the masther nivir knowin' a word about it. When he woke 
by an' by, an' went home to dinner, he felt so hungry that 
you'd think he'd ate the world, an' dhrink the ocean dhry. 
His dinner was no more to him than a boiled piatee. He 
ate an' he ate, an' he dhrank an' he dhrank, an' he was 
just as hungry an' as thirsty when he got up as he was 
when he sat down. So it went on from day to day, an' 
instead of being betther, 'tis worse and worse he was 
gettin' ever an' always. 

" One neighbour come in, an' anoth'er, an' not one of 
'em could give the laste account of what aileded him. An' 
what was worst of all was, that in place o' getting fat 
with all he ate, 'tis laner an' laner he was gettin' every 
day, till he was a complete nottomy. Not a ha'porth he 
ett or dhrank done him any good. 

" Still nobody could tell from Adam what was the 
matther with him. The docthor that was in the place, 
although bein' a very knowin' man, he knew nothin' what- 
ever of this ailment, never meetin' a case o' the kind before. 
One neighbour recommended one thing, and another an- 
other, but the masther didn't give in to any of 'em some 
way, an' when they'd bring him any great physic, in place 
o' takin' it, he'd give it to the missiz to keep for him. 
Well, one day he came in, lookin' so pale and wake, that 
he was ready to dhrop. ' There's no use in talkin', my 
dear', says he to the missiz, ' but there's some bad work 
goin' on inside in me '. ' Can't you take some of the mud- 
dicines, my love ?' says she. ' Rech 'em hether', says he, 
' I believe I must do something'. So she rech'd 'em all 
down. * Why, then, the Heavens direct me now', saya 
the missiz, ' which o' these I'm to give you', says she, 
lookin' at the hape. ' I'll tell you what', says the mas- 
ther, * if one o' them is good, the whole o' them must be 



THE BARBER OF BANTKT. 189 

betther. Make them get a saucepan*, says he, * an' a 
dhrop o' wather'. So she did. The saucepan was brought, 
and the niasther haved 'em all into it headforemost, bottles, 
an' pills, an' powders, in as they wor, an' boiled 'em all 
together with the dhrop o' wather. When it was boiled 
he dhrank it, an' little was wan ten but it was the last 
dhrop he ever dhrank. He lost his walk* the same 
day, an' before night it was all the same thing as over 
with him. 

" Well, nothin' would satisfy the missiz, but some doc- 
thor should see him, to keep peop'e's tongues quiet. 
While she was thinkin' who she'd send for, an ould bucogh 
come to the doore axin' charity, an' he up an' tould her 
where she'd get a rale docthor. ' There's a docthor', says 
he, ' livin' upon the borders of Kerry, an' if there's any 
man', says he, ' that's able to raise the dead to life, 'tis 
he'. So the missiz called Tim Dalton, or Tim Tell-truth, 
as we med all to call him, by raison he never would tell a 
word o' thruth by his own good will, an' sent him off on 
horseback for this great docthor. I can only give you 
Tim's word for what took place, until he came back next 
day following. He rode for a good part of a day, until he 
come into the lonesomest mountain counthry he ever seen 
in his life. He made inquiries, and they showed him 
where the docthor lived, in a lonesome house down 
in a little glen, an' the smoke comin' out o' the chimney. 
•Well', says Tim to me, au' he tcllin' me the story, 'I 
med for the house, an' if I did, there I seen all the place 
sthrown all round with dead men's bones, an' the pathway 
up to the hall-doore was paved with little white things 
that looked just like knuckle-bones. Well become me', 
says Tim, ' I med for the hall doore, an' gev a great rap, 
and axed for the docthor. The sarvant girl showed me 
into the kitchen, where there was a great pot biliu' on the 
fire. Thinks I to myself, I wondher what in the world is 
* The use of his limbs. 



190 THE BARBER OF BANTRT. 

in the pot. So while I was wondherin', the doithor come 
ont an' axed me my business, which I up an' toult him. 
" Well", says he, " stay asy a minute, an' I'll be with you ; 
but for your life", says he, " take care you don't look after 
me*'. ' I'll engage', says Tim, ' I wasn't said by him, but 
the instant he left the kitchen, I took an' opened the doore, 
an' gave a dawny peep into the room that was inside it'. 
Well, what Tim seen in that room, he never was very 
ready to tell, only from that day out, ho wouldn't take a 
taste of muddicine if he was dyin'. He used to say he seen 
keelers all round the room, an' dead people liangin' up, 
an' their blood dhroppin' into the keelers, to make muddi- 
cines. I'm sure, as for myself, I only hould it to be one 
of Tim's stories. But he brought the docthor away with 
him, any way. 

" When the docthor come to the ould masther's room, 
an' felt his pulse, he looked very sarious. He began 
makiu' a cut jest anear the heart with his instbruments, an' 
I declare you could hear the wolf barkin' inside, quite 
plain, at every cut he made. So he brought out the wolf, 
an' showed it to us all — a little dawny thing not the length 
o' my finger, but the tail going like a switch, an' the eyes 
like little sparks of fire. But howsomever it was, the 
poor masther didn't get much good of it, an' 'twasn't long 
afther that we had to lay him with his people. 

" Be coorse, the masther's son, Misther Henry, como 
after him — an' a sore day it was for the estate, the day 
it come into his hands. If the ould masther was over 
foolish in spendin', he was twice more so. Cocks, an' 
horses, an' hounds, an' every other ha'p'orth that the first 
gentleman in the land could fancy, he had about him from 
year to year. But it wasn't that that broke him after all, 
only I'll tell you. 

" There was a poor Dumby the ould masther kep, that 
used to dhraw out anything in the whole world upon a 
slate ; he was still in the house when the new uiasthei 



THE BARBLB OF BANTRY. 191 

was goin' on this way. Well, of a day when Misther 
Thomas was gettin' ready for the Curragh, sure the very 
day hefore the jockey was to take her off, the mare was 
found dead in the stable ! The masther was fit to be tied 
— so he sent off privately for Shaun Dooley, a knowledge- 
able man that lived down near the say-side, that had a 
great report for bein' thick with the good people. Tis 
myself went for him, an' carried a led horse ready saddled 
to bring him up to Tipsy Hall, not to spake of a goold 
guinea I had for him at the first word. I waited till 
night-fall, because the masther would be very unfond any 
body should know he'd send for a fairy docthor. 

" I brought Shaun Dooley up to the masther, and he 
seemed for a while greatly puzzled to know what could 
be the cause of it. i Did you ever shoot a weazel ?' says 
Shaun Dooley. ' Not to my knowledge', says the mas- 
ther. ' Or a magpie ?' ' Not as I remember, indeed'. 

* Do you be whistlin' when you do be out at night at all ?' 
' That can't be', says the masther, ' for I never turned a 
tune'. ' Well, I don't know in the world what to think 
of it', says Shaun. So while he was thinkin', there was 
a great flutterin' outside. ' What's that noise?' says Shaun 
Dooley. 'I suppose it's the pigeons that's comin' home', 
Bays the masther. ' Pigeons !' cries Shaun, ' do you keep 
pigeons about the hoxise ? It's plain to me now', says 
he, ' what rason your mare died, an' I wouldn't wondher', 
says he, ' if all belongin' to you was gone to rack and ruin'. 

* What rason ?' says the masther. ' I'll not tell you what 
rason', says Shaun, ' but if you take my advice, you'll 
not have one of 'era about the place'. 

u He went, an' next mornin' airly the masther went 
about shootin all the pigeons. There was one of em that 
the Dumby had tamed, an' when he seen "em all shootin', 
he took an' hid it from the masther, poor crathur, it was so 
quiet an' so fond of him. Well, sure enough, in less than 
two months afther the ould missiz died, an' the masther 



192 THE BARBER OF BANTRT. 

found out that the Dumby kept the pigeon. I never seen one 
so wild. He turned the Dumby out o' doors (although 
the crathur cried a gallon full, an' went on his knees to 
ax pardon), an' twisted the head off o' the pigeon. But 
it was no good for him. From that day out it seemed as 
if the luck went out o' the doors with the Dumby. And 
when the next Mr. Moynehan came into the property, he 
found himself much in the situation of more jentlemen in 
the country then an' now, that have 'pon my honour, and 
nothing to back it ". 



CHAPTER V. 

But since the accession of this third Moynehan to th« 
proprietorship of Tipsy Hall brings us into the most im- 
portant portion of our tale, we shall take the story out of 
the hands of Kick Lillis, and resume our own task as 
historians of the ruined building. 

So indeed it was. In the course of less than half a 
century, the fair estate which Mr. Moynehan was so 
anxious should be long preserved in the hands of his 
posterity, had melted away to a small remnant, which was 
wholly inadequate to tlie maintenance of the family in the 
style of splendid hospitality which they had always upheld. 
What added to this embarrassment was that Mr. Thomas 
Moynehan never could be prevailed upon to augment his 
diminishing income by seeking some situation suitable to 
his rank, which he might easily have procured amongst 
his influential friends. Antiquarians tell us that among 
the ancient Irish, all occupations of a commercial nature 
were held in the highest scorn, and the term, ceanuighe, 
or merchant, was considered wholly incompatible with 
that of a gentleman. Until a very late period a strong 
tincture of the same spirit appears to have influenced tho 



THE BABBEK OF BANTRY. 193 

conduct of our Irish gentry. Mr. Moynehan seemed to 
think that his family would be disgraced if he were actually 
to earn the bread which he had hitherto received as his 
patrimonial right. A circumstance which took place while 
affairs were io this condition is said to have had a strong 
effect in withdrawing him from society, and indeed in 
hastening his death. 

The public road, which passed close by Mr. Moynehan's 
gate, was the same by which the judges of assize were 
accustomed to travel on their way to the western towns. 
It happened one evening (so goes the tale) that one of 
those personages who was about to open a commission in 
Tralee, was overtaken by nightfall in the neighbourhood 
of Tipsy Hall. As there was no inn within the distance 
of several miles, and the judge and Mr. Moynehan were 
well acquainted, the former determined to pass the night 
at the house of his friend, and resume his journey on the 
following morning. Accordingly, he directed his coach- 
man to drive through the avenue gate, and he was re- 
ceived with a ready welcome at the open door. 

Mr. Thomas Moynehan, notwithstanding those weak- 
nesses which we have seen, and a certain violence of 
temper, which was at limes uncontrollable, was yet in 
many things a man of a reflective and solemn turn of mind. 
Much of his attention had been given occasionally to the 
nature of human law and the extent of its power over 
human life and liberty. It was his opinion that in most 
governments too little regard was shown to human life; 
and there was one point in particular which moved his 
horror. This was the ease with which circumstantial 
evidence was received in British courts of justice on 
questions of a capital nature. Such convictions, taking 
into account the many occasions on which the innocence 
of the culprit had subsequently been manifested in time 
to redeem his reputation, but not to save his life, appeared 
to hiia in th* light of so many formal and deliberate murders 
9 



194 THE BARBER OF BANTRT. 

On the present occasion, as the judge and he were 
sitting quietly together by the fire-side after dinner, he 
could not resist the opportunity of introducing his fa- 
vourite topic. He found, as he had expected, his learned 
guest entirely of the other way of thinking. The judge 
eaid that it was true, circumstantial evidence might some- 
times be merely specious, and undoubtedly in such cases it 
was wrong to convict; but that there were circumstances 
which were fully as demonstrative of the guilt or 
innocence of the accused as the most direct ocular 
testimony could be. 

" For", said he, " Gentlemen of the Ju — Mr. M oynehan, 
I should say — we must remember that the degree of 
certainty is not altered by the nature of the evidence. 
Certainty is certainty still, by whatever means it is obtained. 
I am certain that two and two are the equation of four, 
and I am certain that this glass, if I drop it, will fall on 
the floor, and I am certain that King Charles the First 
lost his head. My certainty with regard to the three 
positions is the same, yet the means by which I arrive at it 
are different; for the last fact I have only on hearsay, 
whereas the others are physical and metaphysical truths. 
So I grant you circumstantiid evidence can only give us 
moral certainty ; yet moral certainty, when it is certainty 
at all, is fully equal to any other whatsoever. When 
people say they are only morally certain of anything, 
they use a vulgar expression, which means that they are 
not certain at all ; for if they were morally certain, they 
would be perfectly so ". 

So saying, he hemmed, nnd looked as if he expected 
there should be no reply. Accordingly Mr. Moynehan, 
though he could not see what the lecture upon the nature 
of certainty had to do with his own assertion that circum- 
stantial evidence could never produce it in a conscientious 
mind, did not conceive it prudent to urge the matter further, 
contenting himself with saying that perhaps the time 



THE BARBER OF BANTEY. 195 

might yet arrive when he would have an opportunity of 
furnishing his lordship with a case in point. 

On the following day the judge continued his route, and 
Mr. Moynehan resumed his customary occupations. He 
still continued to reflect much upon the injustice of 
depriving a fellow-creature of life where there was even a 
possibility of his innocence. Even if there were cases, as 
he doubted not there might be some, in which circum- 
stantial evidence might amount to certainty, he was yet 
convinced that no such strength of testimony was required 
in the great number of instances in which convictions had 
taken place. The more he thought upon it, the more he 
became assured of the correctness of his own views, and he 
only longed for an opportunity of converting the judge 
to his opinion. 

In a few mornings afterwards he was preparing to take 
breakfast at an early hour, when Rick Lillis entered the 
parlour, to say, with a countenance aghast with horror, 
that some countrymen without had taken a murderer, 
and wanted that Mr. Moynehan (who was a justice of 
the peace) should commit him to the county gaol. Mr. 
Moynehan seemed deeply struck at the intelligence. It 
seemed as if he even felt a nearer interest in the case 
owing to his recent controversy with the judge. 

" Let them wait outside", said he, " until I have done 
breakfast, and 1 will hear them''. 

In a short time after he ordered the men to be sum- 
moned into the office, where he usually took his ex- 
aminations. Three countrymen entered, conducting a 
fourth, who by his pale and terrified countenance, his dis- 
ordered appearance, and some reddish stains upon his 
garments, was evidently the person accused. One of the 
others held a pitchfork, the handle of which was dabbled 
with blood. 

Mi". Moynehan, who knew the man perfectly well as one 

his own labourers, and one of the most peaceable cha- 



196 THE BARBER OF BANTRY. 

meters in the country, seemed much concerned at be- 
holding him in snch a situation, bnt determined to give 
the fullest hearing to all the parties. 

" Plase your worship", said the eldest of the three 
accusers, " this boy an' ray son Ned were at work to- 
gether yestherday, an' they had some words comin home, 
which nobody then took much notice of. But this 
morning it so happened that I went to work in your 
honour's piatee garden agreeable toordhers. It was early, 
an' I expected to be first upon the ground, which I knew to 
be plaisin' to your honour, but I was overtaken on the road 
by these two neighbours ; so the three of us went on together 
with our spades in our hands. When we come into the field 
it was just the dusk o' dawn. 'Stop', says this man here 
to me, 'don't you hear groaning?' ' I hard something', 
says I; 'but I made nothing of it, thinkin' it was the 
wind '. ' 'Tis not the wind ', says he, ' but some one 
that got a bad hurt, an' there they are !' Sure enough, at 
that minute we seen this boy here thrying to make off 
with a pitch-fork — this pitch-fork here — in his hand, but 
we pinned him. Little I knew what use he was afthcr 
puttin' it to. I wish I had no more to tell — it's dear I 
aimed your worship's piatees. We found my poor boy 
a dead corpse in the furrow, an' there's the villian 
that done it *. 

The two other witnesses being examined, corroborated 
in all its circumstances the evidence given by the first. 
Having patiently heard all they had to say, and finding 
that they had not detected the man in the very act, Mr. 
Moynehau seemed desirous to dismiss the case. It waa 
true, he said, they had found the man on the spot, and 
with the bloody weapon in his hand, and with his hands 
on the dead body. This and his precipitate flight when 
Been, and the disagreement of the previous evening, were 
strong circumstance- ; yet they did not amount to actual 



THE BARBER OF BAKTRT. 197 

ividence of guilt, and he called on the prisoner for his 

explanation. 

The unhappy man turned pale and red alternately, and 
trembled as if his doom had been already fixed. He 
acknowledged the dispute, and indeed all the circumstances 
deposed by his accusers, yet he attested Heaven that he 
was wholly guiltless. 

"I went into the field", said he, "to my work, an' I 
found the corpse before me in the furrow, an' the pitch- 
fork lvin a-near it, an' while I was feelin' him to see had 
he any life, an' examinin' the spade, these people come 
upon me. I run, becase I was afeerd they'd say 
'twas I done it, an' I took the pitch-fork with me in 
my fright". 

Mr. Moynehan, who seemed affected in the strongest 
manner by the poor fellow's anxiety, was so far from 
judging him guilty, that he peremptorily refused to issue 
a warrant of committal, and used all his influence to 
dissuade the friends of the deceased from proceeding further 
against the prisoner. To this, however, they would by no 
means listen. They conveyed the accused before another 
magistrate, who committed him to gaol without hesitation. 

The day of trial came, and Mr. Moynehan happened 
to be one of the jury. The evidence was the same as 
before — the judge his old acquaintance. To the whole 
court, except Mr. Moynehan, the testimony seemed con- 
clusive. He, however, would not listen to the thought of 
a conviction. The arguments of his eleven fellow-jurors 
were in vain — he would not subscribe to their verdict. 
The foreman made his report to the judge, who reproached 
Mr. Moynehan severely with his obstinacy. The latter, 
however, was not to be moved, and the issue was (as the 
tumour goes) that the jury were kished, and the prisoner 
set at liberty. 

When the judge had returned to his lodgings, he could 



198 THE BARBER OF BANTRT. 

not avoid reflecting on the extraordinary character of thia 
man, who had thus, to gratify a favourite theory, let a 
murderer loose upon society, and set up his iwn solitary 
judgment against the unanimous conviction of a crowded 
court. So deeply did it prey upon his mind, that he sent 
for Mr. Moynehan, in order that they might exchange 
some quiet conversation on the subject. The latter readily 
attended on his summons. 

"My lord", said Mr. Moynehan, with a serious air, 
on hearing the cause of the judge's message, "you may 
remember a conversation which we had some time since on 
the subject of circumstantial evidence ?" 

"Perfectly well", replied the judge. 

" I told your lordship then ", said Mr. Moynehan, " that 
the time might yet arrive when I should have an opportunity 
of making you a convert to my own opinion". 

"That time, Mr. Moynehan, is certainly yet to come ; 
for I never knew a case so clearly against yon, as that 
which we have tried to-day. May I request to know jour 
reasons for such extraordinary — perseverance — to give it 
no harsher name ?" 

"My reasons are at your lordship's service", answered 
Mr. Moynehan, " provided that I have your solemn word 
of honour not to divulge them during my own lifetime". 

The jndge, without hesitation, gave him the promise 
he desired. 

" I admit, my lord", said Mr. Moynehan, " that this 
case had all the strength of circumstantial testimony which 
you considered necessary ; but I could not in conscience 
convict the prisoner, for I am myself the slayer of 
the deceased". 

The judge started back in horror. 

"Yes", said he, "it happened on that morning that I 
was in the field before any of my workmen. The deceased 
was the first who made his appearance, and I rebuked 
him for his neglect. Being a mac of hot temper, ha 



THE BARBER OF BANTRT. 199 

answered me with more than equal warmth, and I lost all 
command of mine. I struck him — he returned the blow 
— I held the pitch-fork in my hand, and with one blow 
more I felled him to the earth. I fled in terror, and in 
less than one hour after, the prisoner was brought before 
me. Judge whether I had not reason to be constant in 
my verdict of acquittal". 

The judge kept his promise, but from that day forward 
he was more cautious in receiving circumstantial evidence 
on a capital charge. 

On the death of Mr. Thomas Moynehan (a considerable 
portion of whose history might, perhaps, in the reader's 
opinion, have been omitted with advantage) the estate 
and mansion of Tipsy Hall fell into the hands of Edmond 
Moynehan, his nephew, and the last of the iace who 
held dominion beneath its roof. 



CHAPTER VL 

Mb. Edmond Moynehan, though succeeding tc a dimi- 
nished income, had been in some respects more fortunate 
than any of his predecessors. He had received an excellent 
education, in the truest sense of the word, and up to the 
period of his accession to the estate of Tipsy Hall, had 
used it, in all appearance, to the best advantage. As far 
as any one could be said to enjoy happiness in a world 
where people find no situation so good that they do not long 
for better, Mr. Edmond Moynehan was a happy man. He 
had a wife, who, whether as a doctress, counsellor, or 
housewife, was without her equal in the country side. At 
the time when they were suddenly called to the inhe» 
ritance of Tipsy Hall, they inhabited a small cottage near 
the romantic town where the Knights of the Valley once 
held feudal sway. Their scanty income was derived from 



200 THE BARBEB OF BANTRT. 

their agricultural pursuits; and industry, united with 
economy, enabled them to maintain a more respectable 
station in their neighbourhood than many who were far 
superior in fortune. For it must be understood, that all 
this while it was not wholly for want of knowing better 
that so much dissipation prevailed among the Irish country 
squires, and instances might occasionally be found, of 
families who fulfilled in every respect the duties of their 
station. Of this description were Mr. Edinond Moynehan 
and his wife ; they were examples of piety and of sobriety 
to their humble neighbours ; they were active benefactors 
of the poor around them ; and in a country where the 
wealthier gentry seldom made their appearance, it was 
an incalculable advantage to the peasantry to have even 
one family who could in some degree supply their place 
as counsellors and protectors. Fortunately kept at a 
distance from the coarse corruption that surrounded them, 
by their own good sense, they were still more fortunate in 
living at a distance from the more dangerous, because 
more subtle and less perceptible, corruption that prevailed 
then, as at all times, in towns and cities. They were 
happy even in their ignorance how far the human mind 
And heart can go astray when they have forsaken the path 
of simple truth. It was true they saw vice around them, 
but they never yet had seen it justified : they saw the duties 
of religion neglected, but they did not know that the mind 
can even be brought to vindicate such neglect, and give 
it specious names. They maintained their plain and simple 
course, at peace with themselves and Heaven, and in good 
will with the whole world. Of politics (in the angry sense 
of the word) or of controversy, they heard and thought 
but little, and maintained a primitive simplicity as well in 
their mode of thinking as of living. They fasted on all the 
fast days, and they kept all the holidays holy. They never 
troubled their heads about new points of doctrine, and thua 
were left more leisure to practise what they already believed. 



THE BAKBEB OF BANTBT. 201 

Perhaps it would be difficult for a person engulfed in 
the vortex of the world and all its cares, absorbed by the 
anxieties of commerce, the intrigues of love or of ambition, 
or consumed by the devouring thirst of fame or power, to 
imagine the happiness which the Moynehans up to this period 
had enjoyed in their tranquil river-side life. It was not 
slothful, for the Moynehans were stirring with the dawn, and 
till sunset occupied in some charitable or useful avocation ; 
Mr. Moynehan in the fields with his workmen, or on the road 
to some neighbouring fair, his fair help-mate in the dairy, 
or superintending her flax-dressers in the open barn, or 
hearing her son Edinond read aloud while she knitted a 
stocking at the parlour window. Neither was it a solici- 
tous life, for their attachment to the world or its posses- 
sions was not so strong as to awaken anxiety; the solitude 
in which they lived kept reflection awake, and no artificial 
rapidity of profit, or intoxicating violence of pleasure, ever 
seduced them into forgetfulness of the real value of mortal 
hope or joy. Even their love for each other was, we fear, 
such as would by no means satisfy a real votary of romance. 
That poetical gentleman, who said he knew only two 
places in the universe — viz., where his mistress was, and 
where she was not — would have looked with scorn upon Mrs. 
Moynehan ; for she knew a great many places besides 
that where her husband was ; and yet it was not saying a 
little to assert that, after ten years of wedded life, there 
was no other which she liked so well. 

If, amongst the many who occasionally shared the hos- 
pitality of Moynehan's cottage, some votary of fashion 
made his appearance, the life of these simple people must 
have appeared to hiin insipid, dull, and monotonous in the 
extreme. There was nothing in their tranquil pastoral 
enjoyments at all so highly seasoned as to satisfy a devotee 
ot pleasure, and he would have attributed to the nature of 
the life they led the insipidity which was wholly owing to 
the defect in his own sense. But to the Moynehans, 



202 THE *«.>BER OF BANTRT. 

whose reiish for the pleasnws of innocence had never heen 
dulled by any acquaintance <vith those of vice, it did not 
appear that there was anythrrg so tasteless or so burdensome 
in their daily life. They fovnd health in the morning air, 
that blew freshly from tho sunlit river, and relief from 
weariness of mind in the occupations of their farm. The 
undecorated exhortation ot their parish clergyman on 
a Sunday, had with them more weight than all the 
eloquence and learning of a metropolitan pulpit upon the 
ears of metropolitan hearers. It might be said of them 
with truth, that they thought more with the heart than 
with the head, and if they had not the learning, neither 
had they the pride, of the philosopher. 

From this humble, simple life it was that the Moynehans 
were called to the inheritance of Tipsy Hall. The news 
came upon them somewhat unexpectedly, and it might be 
almost said without a welcome. The cottage in which 
they now lived had been their residence since they were 
united. It was the birth-place of their only son, and the 
scene of their calm and prosperous industry during so many 
happy years. The accession, however, to such a property 
as that of Tipsy Hall was too important an addition to 
their fortune to be neglected, and they prepared for a 
removal. Mrs. Moynehan, in particular, had a strong 
misgiving with respect to this migration, and felt as if 
every knock of the carpenters, as they were taking the 
furniture to pieces for the purpose of conveyance, sounded 
the knell of their departing happiness. There was no 
use, however, indulging, much less communicating, such 
fancies. 

The day appointed for their removal came, and a number 
of weeping friends and neighbours assembled to bid farewell 
to their long-established associates and companions. An 
elderly lady, who had often filled the office of counsellor 
and instructor to Mrs. Moynehan on critical occasions, 
and who had not been sparing of her rhetoric upon the 



THE BARBER OF BANTRY. 203 

present, gave so many hints with respect to a family 0/ 
the name of Tobin, living within the distance of twc 
miles of Tipsy Hall, that Mrs. Moynehan became quite 
alarmed. 

" I do not want to make you uneasy, my dear, by 
what I say", concluded this sagacious friend, " but to 
make you cautious in time. I know how little relish Mr. 
Moynehan has for such society — indeed he's an angel of a 
man — where will you meet such another? — but men are 
men after all — the best men are frail, and the Tobins are 
enough to corrupt a monastery". 

" Is it possible ?" said Mrs. Moynehan, astonished ; " I 
thought Mr. Tobin was a magistrate of the county. Does 
he not sit at the Quarter Sessions ?" 

" He does — and a pretty magistrate he is ; but I don't 
choose to say any more at present. I have said enough 
to put you on your guard, and that was my only reason 
for speaking at all. The Tobins are a very good family, 
no doubt, and have excellent connections, but it is a 
wild house !" 

Mrs. Moynehan thanked her friend for those suggestions, 
which she promised to bear in mind. Soon after they set 
out for Tipsy Hall, their mode of conveyance being suited 
rather to their past than to their present fortunes. It con- 
sisted of a truckle or low cart with a block of timber for an 
axle-tree. On this were laid a feather bed and quilt, on 
which Mrs. Moynehan and her son Edmond, a child about 
six years of age, took their seat, while Neddy Shaughnessy, 
"the boy" who acted as charioteer to the group, sat 
with his legs dangling from a corner. Behind rode Mr. 
Moynehan on horseback, musing much upon their sudden 
change of fortune. Even already his helpmate could ima- 
gine that she beheld a shade of solicitude darkening over 
his features, which, until this unhoped improvement had 
taken place in their circumstances, were as clear and un- 
ruffled as a noontide lake. 



204 THE BARBF.K OF BAHTBY. 

It was evening when they entered the small demesne of 
Tipsy Hall, Mr. Moynehan still looking more serious than 
he had ever done in his life before, and his soft-hearted 
companion crying as if some terrible misfortune had 
befallen them both. Her grief attracted the interest of 
Rick Lillis, who at first entertained some involuntary 
prejudice against his new master and mistress. In the 
course of the evening, while he was busy in arranging 
some furniture under her directions, she took an opportunity 
of making some inquiries about theTobins. 

"A family o' the name of Tobin, ma'am, please youi 
honour?" echoed Lillis, when he had heard her question. 
" There is indeed then, an' there's none has betther rason to 
know it than the masther's family; an' if youplase, ma'am, 
plase your honour, Mrs. Moynehan, since you axed mo 
the word, I'll tell yon my mind o' them people, not out of 
any ill-will to them, but the way you'd put the masther 
upon his guard again 'em, in case they'd be borrowin' 
money or inveiglin' him any way to his hurt. Them 
Tobins, ma'am, ain't right people, with submission to you. 
They'd bony money, an' they wouldn't pay it, an' if they 
couldn't borry, there's rason for sayin that they'd go some 
other way about gettin' it besides what would be proper. 
You'd lend em a hundhert pounds, an' when you'd go to ax 
for your money, afther, in place o' gettin' it or thanks, 
instead of it may be 'tis to challenge you to fight 'em they 
would— they're such jewellers, Lord save us! There isn't 
such jeitflyery goin' on all over Ireland, ma'am, as 
what they goes on with ; a very black, terrible family, 
ma'am". 

In the course of the ensuing fortnight, nearly all the 
families within three miles round, who had any pretensions 
to gentility, had visited the new proprietors of Tipsy Hall. 
The Moynehans had never before received so much atten- 
tion, or had to digest so large a quantity of civil flattery. 
The Tobins were almost the ouly family that might have 



THE BARBER OF BANTRY. 205 

been expected, and yet did not make their appearance. 
Never, for a considerable time, was there so thorough a 
revolution effected in any establishment as in that of Tipsy 
Hall. During the ensuing two years, the mansion hardly 
knew itself; every thing was done in order; the traces of a 
sober and careful management were visible in all quarters. 
They did not here consider it a part of hospitality to make 
their guests drunk at their table, and it was remarked by 
Rick Lillis, that it was the first time since the foundation- 
stone of the building had been laid, that two successive 
years had rolled over the roof of Tipsy Hall, without its 
being possible for any body to say with truth that he had 
seen a human being " tossicated" within its walls, or a 
tradesman leave the door with his bill unpaid. 

Notwithstanding all that Mrs. Moynehan could do to 
prevent such an occurrence, her husband became acquainted 
with the Tobins, and relished their acquaintance. Their 
wit, their fun, their show of good-nature and of hospitality, 
could not fail to win some favour from one who really was 
what they affected to be. There are many persons whose 
very virtues, or at least dispositions for virtue, are often 
sources of strong temptation to themselves. Mr. Moyne- 
han's frank and unsuspecting nature and social temperament 
were to him occasions of imminent danger. The Tobins 
talked so pleasantly, and so good-humouredly, and so good- 
naturedly, that he found it impossible not to like their 
company. Of the justice of this opinion, Mrs. Moynehan 
could not form any correct idea, for as there were nc 
females amongst the family at Castle Tobin, she had never 
Bet her foot within its precincts. Her opinion, at first so 
unfavourable, became something more tolerant, however, 
when, after several months had passed, she could not 
recollect that her husband had once returned home with 
any symptom of those excesses about him, which she had 
been taught to apprehend at Castle Tobin. 

In another way, however, their acquaintance was not so 



206 THE BARBER OF BANTRY. 

advantageous. On two or three occasions, old Mr. Tobin 

had found it necessary to trespass on his friend Moynehan's 
purse, to an amount already rather embarrassing; and 
with what the latter could not help thinking the best 
intentions in the world, these moneys had never been 
repaid. Mrs. Moynehan, however, as soon as she understood 
what had taken place, was determined to provide against 
a recurrence of the same misfortune. She entered upon 
the subject one morning at the breakfast table, and after 
a severe lecture on the injustice he was committing towards 
their child, as well as those who had better claims on his 
assistance, obliged him to "make a vow" that he never 
again would lend money to the Tobins without her con- 
currence. He did so, and all was peace for some time 
after. 

All hitherto was well with Mr. Moynehan. He had a 
property, moderate, it is true, but to which his industry 
was daily adding something ; a wife who knew Buchan's 
Domestic Medicine, in the country phrase, from cover to 
cover ; and in whose eyes he was, without exception, the 
greatest man in Ireland ; a promising boy, acknowledged 
0:1 all hands to be the " living image " of himself, and a 
tenantry who looked up to him for assistance and protection, 
and were never disappointed. He rose at morning with 
the sun, dressed himself briskly, was not ashamed to 
go down on his knees to return thanks for the past, and 
petition for the future ; nor did he think himself a whit the 
worse for never omitting this duty either at night or morning. 
He kept a hospitable board ; a door " that opened with a 
latch"; a bed for the traveller; a warm fire-side and a whole- 
some dinner for the humble mendicant. When he had dis- 
charged his duties his conscience was at rest, and if any of his 
neighbours at such a time sought to make amends for their 
own delinquencies by lecturing him, he would listen in 
silence, contented with having done what other people only 
seemed to talk about. 



THB BABBEB OF BANTRT. 207 

Thfs life of tranquillity and goodness, however, iras 
doomed to meet with ft singular reverse. The fiend, 

grown wiser than of yore, 

Who tempts by making rich, not making poor, 

put it into the head of some official functionary of the state 
to appoint Mr. Moynehan a collector of assessed taxes 
i ! his district, and into Mr. Moynehan's to accept it. 
What the publicans were in the ancient Roman provinces, 
the tax-collectors were at a certain period in " our own 
green isle", that is to say, persons well paid for taking pains 
to make their own fortunes. A few years before, the pro- 
prietor of Tipsy Hall might have thought such a situation 
not worthy of his acceptance, but a considerable alteration 
had taken place in the affairs of that establishment. It was 
therefore with no little satisfaction that Mr. Moynehan re- 
ceived the appointment, wholly ignorant as he was of the 
innumerable risks by which it was attended. He had hereto- 
fore been honest, and he did not see why a man might not be 
an honest tax-gatherer as well as an honest farmer. Accor- 
dingly he set about the duties of his new office with alacrity. 
An eminent statesman, some years since, when about 
to announce the intention of government to repeal the 
assessed taxes in Ireland, assigned as one of the motives 
which influenced ministers in coming to such a resolution 
— " that they were found to fall very heavy upon those 
country gentlemen who were kind enough to pay them". 
Mr. Moynehan found few of his neighbours so disposed. 
It was true, nothing could be more frank and hospitable 
than the manner in which they all received him when he 
came to their houses. They loaded him with attentions. 
The best bed in the house and the best wine in the cellar 
were at his service. They had company to meet him, and 
they had a thousand little things which he might want, 
And which they would find an opportunity to send him. 
Bat few articles liable to king's taxes could he find in their 



208 THE SIBBER OF BAKTitT. 

possession. They had no windows — no hearths — no cows 
— no carriages; all the wealth which on the previous 
evening had been displayed with so much munificence, 
had dwindled on the following morning into absolute 
poverty. Mr. Moynehan was thunderstruck ; but he could 
not help himself. His predecessors in office, he was told, 
had pursued a certain line of conduct, and he must not 
make himself singular. On one occasion his precisenesa 
was near involving liim in a serious affair. There was no 
carriage, he was told ; and as he knew that truth towards 
a tax-gatherer was not here regarded with much scru- 
pulosity, he asked to see the coach-house. The gentleman 
bowed in assent, but signified at the same time that lie 
considered such conduct as an impeachment of his veracity. 
Mr. Moynehan did not persist, and he was favoured in a 
few days with a cordial salute from this veracious gentleman 
as he passed him in a dashing cabriolet. It was indeed 
a thing almost impossible (so irresistible is the influence 
of bad example) to hold the office and to keep the hands 
untainted — 

And things impossible can't be, 
And never, iwer come to pass. 

Temptation effected for Mr. Moynehan what it has effected 
for millions. It wrought his fall. Bribes were poured in 
upon him from all quarters. One supplied his table — one 
his manger — another his binn— a fourth his cellar — a 
hundred his pantry. Every house in the country had a 
convivial board, a comfortable chamber, and a blazing fire 
for the tax-gatherer. The least he felt to be expected for 
these civilities was (like the unjust steward), where one 
owed a hundred bushels to the state, to take his pen and 
write down fifty, or perhaps not a fifth of that, and it often 
happened that even that fifth remained unpaid. 

Those who have once enjoyed the peace of a pure con- 
science, cannot find repose in its opposite. Neither the 



THE BARBER OF EAKTBY. 209 

influence of an example that seemed almost universal, noi 
the stunted maxims of convenience by which the tax- 
gatherer sought to satisfy his mind, could make his new 
life happy. " What signifies it ! when the loss is divided 
amongst so many that they can't feel it?" — " Sure every 
body is doing it". — "What good would it do to have one 
out of a thousand go against all the rest?" Such were the 
arguments by which at moments of reflection he resisted 
the warnings of conscience, but which could not wholly 
silence its reproaches. We grieve to relate the is-ue. 
When peace of mind is lost, men generally seek to supply 
its place by false excitement, and so did Mr. Moynehan. 
He found it easier to divert his attention from the con- 
sideration of his evil ways, than to take up a vigorous re- 
solution and amend them. Accordingly, Moynehan, the 
pattern of sobriety and decorum to his neighbourhood, fell 
by degrees into habits of vulgar dissipation. He seldom 
now returned sober to his home. His rational hours were 
hours of hurry, and fretfulness, aud impatience, and he 
now was only mirthful when reason had been drowned in 
whisky punch. 

It must not be supposed, however, that this course was 
deliberately chosen by Mr. Moynehan; on the contrary, 
there was scarcely a morning on which he did not renew 
his determination of altering his life, and scarce an evening 
after which this determination did not require a reuewal. 

"Say no more, Mary, say no more", he said, after 
Mrs. Moynehan had given utterance to one of her customary 
morning counsels; "I tell you this is the last night I will 
ever dine away from home". 

" You have often said that". 

"Well, I will fulfil it now". 

" Take my advice, Edmond, and do not dine to-night at 
Castle Tobin. You know that you no longe.- leave that 
bouse in the condition that you ought. The place and the 
company would overcome all the resolutions that were 



210 THE BARBER OF BANTBT. 

ever made. Oh, my dear husband, you are putting an 
end to all our happiness, and, what is worse, you are 
securing your own destruction. Do, Edmond, be guided 
at last by one who loves you better than ever the Tobins 
did. Do not continue to destroy our comfort and the 
hopes of our poor child ; I wish we had never left our 
little cottage on the Shannon side ; I wish we had never 
heard of this estate, that has brought sin and ruin to our 
doors. Will you not grant me this request, my dear 
husband? Will you not look to yourself before it is too 
late ? You dare not think of continuing such a life, and 
how can you tell what time may be given you for amend- 
ing it ?" 

" Say no more, now, Mary, — say no more". 

" But I must say more, Edmond, until I have your 
promise. I am more than ever anxious on this morning, 
for I had the most dreadful dreams last night about you 
and the Tobins ". 

" Pooh, pooh, nonsense". 

" It may be so, and I trust it is so ; but I can't help 
thinking of it. I thought that they made you stay to dine 
at Castle Tobin, and that after making you drunk, they 
were murdering you in a private room, while you cried out 
to them to give you time for repentance, but they refused 
it ". As she said this, she cast herself weeping upon her 
husband's neck. 

" What folly, my dear !" exclaimed Moynehan in an 
angry tone. '*! wonder you could pay attention to such 
silly thoughts; to talk in that manner of the Tobins! some 
of the best fellows breathing, and the warmest friends 
I have ". 

" If they were your real friends", said Mrs. Moynehan, 
"they would not do so much as they are doing to bring 
about your ruin. We were happy until we knew them. 
Listen to me, Edmond. You have already done us 
grievous injury — to me and to your child, and, worst of all, 



THE BABBER OF BANTBT. 211 

to yourself. Stop where you are, and go no farther on the 
road to ruin. Begin this instant, by resolving not to go 
to-night to Castle Tobin, and by keeping that good re- 
solution ". 

"But I promised Tobin, my dear". 

" Break that promise, and come home ", said Mrs. 
Moynehan. " If you expect to change your whole plan of 
life without meeting any difficulties, or without being 
obliged to use any violence to your own wishes, or to those 
of others, you are mistaken, I can assure you. Make this 
one effort resolutely, and the next will be easy ". 

" Pooh, my dear ; is it not a great deal better to keep 
this one promise, since I have made it, and to-morrow, and 
for the future, to take care to make no promise at all ?" 

" It is not", said Mrs. Moynehan. " Every new sin 
makes the bad habit twice as stroug; you will find it 
harder to refuse promising to-morrow,' than you do to 
break the promise you have made to-day. Remain at 
home this evening, Edmond, and begin what you dare not 
think of leaving unbegun for ever". 

The tax-gatherer paused to meditate. Reform and be 
at peace ! A happy prospect ; but how enormous was the 
mountain of guilt that now lay between him and his past 
condition. All that he had ever pilfered from the public 
purse must be restored. That awful word " Restitution" 
had more of terror in it than all besides. What! 
condemn himself to poverty and want for all future life, 
in order to refund the thousands at the embezzlement of 
which he had connived. Why, two long lives, spent in 
the closest economy, would not enable him to repay one 
half the amount. Still, justice confronted him with her 
immutable countenance ; it must be done, or he wan lost 
for ever. 

May one be pardoned, and retain tbe offence? 

He struggled with the uncomfortable conviction ; and 



213 THE BARB EH OF BANTRT. 

nrhfle he did so, the prospect of Mr. Tobin's jovial board, 
the pleasant laughing faces and inspiring cheer by which 
it was to be enlivened, carae before him, and the words 
"lost for ever!" died away on the horizon of his thought 
with a faint and feeble echo. 

While he was deliberating, the hour arrived for his de- 
parture. 

" No", he said to his wife, " I cannot and I will not 
break my promise of dining with Tobin ; but this is the 
last evening I will ever dine away from home. Mind 
now — I have said it, and you shall find that I will keep 
my word". 

Mrs. Moynehan said no more, but a look of agony told 
her disappointment. On entering the hall he found a 
number of people assembled at his levee as usual. 

" My master's compliments, Sir, with a pair of young 
turkeys for Mrs. Moynehan". 

" My master's compliments, Sir, with a bag of oats". 

" My master's compliments, Sir, an' he has the grass o' 
the cow ready now, that he was talkin of". 

" My master's compliments, Sir " 

And a dozen other presents, which there was no re- 
fusing. The messengers were dismissed with suitable 
answers, and the state was defrauded of a fresh portion 
of its revenue. Open-eyed, Mr. Moynehan consented to 
the peculation of some fifty or sixty pounds additional 
from his Majesty's exchequer. And his only apology was 
custom. Every body did it ! Devouring custom ! 

But all was now ready for his departure, and Mrs. Moy- 
nehan's deeper anxieties were swallowed up in providing 
for his personal comfort. 

" Remember, Edmond, if anything should oblige you to 
spend the night at Castle Tobin, to look well to the sheets. 
You remember the last night you slept there that you were 
near bringing home your death of cold. If you just 
hold the sheet that way to your cheek for half a minute 



THE BARBER OF BANTRV. 2 IS 

'taking « corner of her apron to suit the action to the 
word), yott can tell at once whether it is damp or not. 
Here's the opodeldoc — and the thing for the tooth-ache. 
Nelly! Net— Jy!" 

" Goin', goin*, ma'am". 

♦'Where's the comforter?" 

" T is in the pocket o' the masther's loody, ma'am". 

"That terrible stumbling mare! I don't know how you 
can trust your life to her. But you men absolutely don't 
know what fear is. Nolly! Nel — ly!" 

" Goin', ma'am, goin' !" 

" Where's the child ?" 

"Masther Man, where are you, sir? Dont you hear 
yourself calliu' ?" 

The child was brought out to receive his father's cus- 
tomary parting caress. Many further additions were made 
to those 

-lengthened sage advices 



The husband fra the wife despises, 

before the tax-gatherer mounted his horse and rode away. 
Trotting briskly down the avenue which led to the high 
road, a few hours' easy riding brought him to the district 
in which his business for the day was principally cast. It 
is not necessary to follow him through the detail of all his 
occupations. He collected a tolerable sum at the houses 
of the neighbouring gentry, and in disregard of Mrs. Moy- 
nehan's " counsels sweet", took the road to Castle Tobin. 
For a long time after they had left the main road, he 
was accompanied by Rick Lillis, who still filled the same 
situation in the employment of Mr. Moynehan that Faustulus 
did in that of the Latin monarch. The evening had a 
menacing look, and both occasionally glanced at the 
gathering masses of vapour over head, without venturing 
to exchange their apprehensions. At length, the following 
conversation arose between them. 



214 THE BARBER OF BANTBY. 

"Masther". 

"Well, Rick?" 

" Will yon tell me, sir, if you plase, how ranch money 
you may have about you at this pras'nt moment ?" 

" Why do you ask ?" 

u Oh, for rasons o' my own ". 

"I have near five hundred pounds". 

" "lis a dale o' money ", said Rick. 

" It is, indeed ". 

"This is a lonesome road, masther*. 

"Tis, Rick". 

"An' do yon mane to come back this way to-night 
from Castle Tobin, sir?" 

" If I should not be prevailed upon to remain for the 
night * 

Rick looked dissatisfied. 

"'Twas but a poor choice", said he, "between the 
bog and the cliff. I'm not over satisfied, master, about 
the propriety of your having so much money about you 
late at night, an' goin' such a lonesome road. Sure you 
know, sir, 'twouldn't be wishin' to you for a dale, you lost 
that money to-night ". 

"Twould not be wishing to me, Rick, for near five 
hundred pounds ". 

"Ayah, it's no joke at all, masther, nor no laughin' 
matther either. I declare I don't like the thoughts of it, 
at all. 1 tell you there's bad boys about these mountains. 
I'd just as soon expect that one o* them lads would let a 
handful o' money that way pass him by, as I would 
to see a cat left alone with a pail o' milk, an' to have no 
call to it ". 

"Don't you know, Rick, that in the reign of Brian 
Boroimhe, a young lady travelled on foot through Ireland, 
with a gold ring on the top of a long wand, to show 
that there was no such thing as a rogue iu the whole 
island?" 



THE BABBEB OF BANTBT. 



215 



" Why then, sir, sonuher to the hit of that lady ever 
»et foot in these mountains, or if she did, it's more than 
she could do these times. Be said by me, sir, an' go home 
safe an' sound with your money, while you have it ". 

" There is no danger, Rick ", said his master, " for if I 
should not choose to encounter the midnight journey, I can 
take a bed at Castle Tobin ". 

" Why then, I'll tell you ray mind out o' the face w , 
said Rick ; " that's a plan I don't like one bit betther 
than the other. The Lord forgive us, 'tisn't in my way, 
nor any one else's, to be spakin' ill o' those that arn't con- 
vanient to defend themselves ; but there's rasons for what 
I say. I'd be very unfond, if I had it, to pass the night 
at Castle Tobin with such a sum o' money as that. Them 
Tobins have a bad report in the counthry ; they're needy, 
bould, daarin young men (an' Heaven forgive me if I 
belies 'em), that would a'most rob a priest. I declare, I'd 
rather of the two take the road itself, bad as it is. An' see, 
along with that, the night is threat'nin' ". 

Mr. Moynehan could not help feeling struck, iu spite of 
himself, with the double warning that was given him by 
both his wife and servant. The reports of robberies, and 
even worse, among these lonesome hills were not unfrequent ; 
and it . would, he knew, be certain and total ruin to him 
and to his family to lose such a sum as he at present held 
in his saddle-bags. Such, however, is the infatuation of 
habit, that he could not reist the temptation of spending 
a jovial evening with the Tobins, renewiug, nevertheless, 
his determination not to suffer any persuasion to lead him, 
on this night at least, beyond the bounds of perfect mo- 
deration. It was true he felt some uncomfortable twinges 
of conscience when he recollected certain immutable 
truths which he was in the habit of hearing more 
frequently than he heeded their significance ; such as that 
he who wills the cause, wills the effect, and that he who 
would fly the fault must fly the temptation, and that at is 



216 THE BARBER OF BANTBT. 

impossible to court the occasion and avoid the consequence; 
with other maxims of the kind, which, when they pressed 
in too troublesome a manner upon his recollection, he 
strove to banish by putting spurs to his mare, or entering 
into further conversation with Rick Lillis, as he strove to 
keep pace with his master. 

By this time the night had begun to put its menaces 
into execution. The wind, now risen high, came howling 
up the mountain road behind them, and rustling in the 
fields of rushes and bog myrtle which skirted the lone- 
some track. The clouds, with outline faintly visible in 
the gathering darkness, drove rapidly over head, as if 
scared by some terrific power rising far behind on the 
horizon. Large drops of rain gave warning of the ap- 
proaching deluge, and both travellers fastened a few 
additional buttons, and put their horses to a quicker pace. 
Before the storm had burst in all its terror, they had 
reached a crossway where it had been arranged that Lillis 
should take tlie homeward road, while Mr. Moynehau 
con tiu ued his route to CVitle Tobin. 



CHAPTER VI. 

It is necessary that we anticipate the arrival of the tax- 
gatherer, in order to give with all the brevity consistent 
with clearness of narrative, an account of the company 
who awaited him. 

There was, in the first place, Mr. Tobin, the first of the 
family who had made his appearance in the country, and 
who had built the Castle to which he gave his family 
name. This castle, it should be stated, was no castle at 
all, but a plain house, dignified with that sounding name, 
from its occupying what was once the site of a strong- 
bold of the old Earls of Desmond. Busy and malicious 



TOE BARBER OF BANTRT. f 17 

tongues asserted that Mr. Tobin had left his native 
country charged with the crime of Marmion, but nothing 
positive was ever known upon the subject. 

One of his first acts was not calculated to conciliate the 
good will of the country people. In order to procure 
materials for the building, he took down the remaining 
walls of au old monastery, which stood at a little dis- 
tance, rather than, at a slight increase of expense, be at 
the pains of drawing stones from a neighbouring quarry. 
And it was told of him as an instance of retributive 
justice, that in giving directions respecting the shaping 
of one of those stones, a splinter flew off, and, striking 
him in the right eye, deprived him for ever of the benefit 
of that organ. 

There was one peculiarity in the site chosen for the 
edifice which is worth observing. It was so constructed 
that both the principal sitting-room and bed-room were in 
no less than three different counties, so that in case a 
bailiff should make his way unexpectedly into either 
apartment, Mr. Tobin, by shifting his chair from one side 
of the parlour fire-place to another, could plead an 
illegal caption, or if invaded at his dressing table, might 
jump into bed and defy the law and its officer to- 
gether. 

Fie had two sons, who were not blessed with an equal 
share of the parental affection. The idea had got into 
the heads of Mr. Tobin and Lis lady that the eldest boy 
was not their son, but a changeling, and the unhappy 
child was a sufferer to this wretched prejudice. They 
made him do the work of a menial in their kitchen, while 
the second was elevated to the place and privileges of the 
first bora. It was perhaps fortunate for the elder in 
some respects, as he became the only amiable member of 
his family. Wisdom, like grief, says somebody, is an 
affection of the mind, and not a thing to be taught by 
lectures. It was so the elder Tobin learnt it, but the 
10 



£18 THE BARBER OF BANTRT. 

nnkindness of his friends affected his health, and he died 
young. 

He was much missed at Castle Tobin, but the wicked 
preference of the parents was not left without some 
punishment. Young Tobin grew up to be a fine young 
man, and fought, and hunted, and drank, and gambled, 
and showed himself in every way a real son of his 
father, and no changeling whatsoever. And accordingly 
the father doted on him. 

One morning, say the historians of the neighbourhood, 
Mr. Tobin saw his sou going out at a very early hour. 
He asked him where he was going, and the young man 
answered carelessly " nowhere, only up the mountains to 
fight a duel". Whether through recklessness, or that he 
disbelieved the young scapegrace, the father is reported 
to have recommended him to "take the grayhounds with 
him, and that he might have a very pretty course when it 
was over". The son adopted the suggestion, but there 
was no occasion for the dogs. He was brought home, in 
less than two hours after, a corpse, to Castle Tobin. 

It was on the death of his wife, which followed soon 
after, that old Tobin adopted Frank, his nephew, to whom, 
as he was one of the company on this occasion, it is ne- 
cessary that we direct our attention for a little time. 

Frank Tobin had the misfortune of being 

"A self- willed imp, a grandame's child", 

and was left for his education altogether to the system of 
society in which he grew up. As to restraint, he never 
knew what it was to have his wishes contradicted in a 
single instance in which it was physically possible to 
comply with them. His grandmamma, it should be 
known, was a great lady, and had spent many years 
abroad, where she had picked up several notions which it 
was very hard to understand. She hated anything that 
people were used to. Nothing would do for her either in 



THE BAftBER OF BAKTET. i IS 

the way of ribands or principles, except it was spick-and- 
span new. If it were possible to administer nourishment 
at the ears, Mrs. Tobin never would have wished to see 
the mouth employed for that purpose ; and one would 
think, to hear her speak, that it was mere prejudice made 
all mankind persevere in walking erect instead of creeping 
on all-fours. In a word, good Mrs. Tobin was rather a 
charlatan in her notions about educating children, and 
Master Frank Tobin was not five years old before he 
began to turn her foible to his own account ; for none are 
more quicksighted than children in perceiving whether the 
individual entrusted with their instruction is a quack or a 
person of common sense. Though not altogether an ill- 
natured child, he became, from Mrs. Tobin's system of 
passive compliance, one of the greatest pests and tyrants 
that ever plagued a household. His father and mother, 
who had never travelled, did not altogether relish Mrs. 
Tobin's plans, but they were afraid to interfere. His 
grandmother was rich, and they thought she would make 
Frank her heir. 

But she died and disappointed them, as Frank had dis- 
appointed her. And what was now to be done ? Here 
was Frank, a fine gentleman, too proud to take any 
situation, and too poor to do without it. His mode of 
life was now somewhat curious. He used to spend a 
great part of the day fishing, or shooting, or coursing, and 
the produce of his sport he forwarded to the different 
families in the neighbourhood with whom he was con- 
nected by affinity or by liking. He could glaze windows, 
and cement broken china, and mend old furniture, and 
tune pianos, and play a little on the flute, and execute 
Bundry little offices of that kind, which made him a 
welcome visitor at the houses of most of his country 
friends. And if he had confined his accomplishments to 
such matters as these, all would have been well ; but it 
was far otherwise. Although very good-humoured at a 



280 THE BARBER OF BAOTRT. 

convivial meeting, and capable of singing a hearty song 
and passing a merry joke, he was plagued with an un- 
fortunate temper, which Was continually involving him in 
disputes. He had, however, by some means got the name 
of an humourist, and his last adventure was circulated as 
regularly in his own circle as the last bon mot of a legal 
functionary in our own day. There was scarce an Assize 
or Quarter Sessions at which Frank Tobin had not to 
answer some score of charges for assault and battery. A 
child of liberty, Frank could not, from his boyhood, 
endure any system of human law, which he conceived 
wholly unnecessary for the maintenance of society. All 
law and government, he used to say, was a job; a mere 
trick, intended for the purpose of putting money into the 
pockets of lawyers, and throwing impediments in the way 
of young fellows who were "inclined for fun". It was 
all an invention of roguish attorneys and counsellors. This 
theoretical antipathy to the entire system was not without 
its practical effects ; for Frank Tobin visited severely on 
the persons of the individual professors, when they 
happened to fall in his way, his abstract dislike of the pro- 
fession. His highest game, however, in this way, were 
the bailiffs and tipstaffs, who were sent to apprehend him 
for his misdemeanours, or at best some Special Sessions 
Attorney, and with these he waged perpetual and im- 
placable war. 

He was first recommended to the notice of his uncle by 
a characteristic incident. He was sauntering one da) 
through the mountains in the neighbourhood of Castle 
robin, when he saw a countryman at a little distance 
walking to and fro upon a field and looking very disconsolate. 

" Well, my good man", said Frank, " what's the 
matter with you ?" 

" Ah, plase your honour, I'm destroyed. I have a lot- 
ijicat again' that man over, an' I don't know from Adam 
how will I take him". 



THE BARBER OF BANTBT. 221 

He pointed to a house about twenty yards distant. On 
the half door, which was closed, rested the muzzle of a 
blunderbuss, and behind sat the proprietor, quietly seated 
in his chair, and seeming to wait the first hostile move- 
ment on the part of his adversary. Having ascertained 
from the man that the case was one of peculiar hardship, 
Frank Tobin, who was a kind of knight errant in a small 
way, and quite as ready to encounter danger in another's 
behalf as in his own, determined to assist him. He bade 
the man continue to walk up and down while he went to 
seek assistance. He had not gone far before he met one 
of his companions. 

" Tom", said he, " have you got a stick ?" 

" I have, sir". 

" Do you see that house over ?" 

" I do, sir". 

" Well, go round and stand o' one side the back door, 
and when you see a man running out there, knock him 
down". 

" I will, sir", 

Away went Tom, while Frank, slipping close along the 
front of the house, laid both hands upon the muzzle of 
the blunderbuss and efl'ectually secured it. The fellow, 
as he had anticipated, ran for the back door, where Tom 
with great punctuality knocked him down. Both then de- 
livered their prisoner into the hands of the man who had 
got what he called the "latificat", while Frank said: 

" That's the way to do business, my lad, and not to be 
looking for any of your latitats nor rattle-traps neither. 
If you take my advice, you never will have any call to the 
law. It would be long before one of your three-and-nine- 
penny schemers w ould show you how to serve that bit of 
paper after you had got it". 

It happened that the man was a tenant of his uncle, 
who, on hearing of the affair, took Frank under his pa- 
tronage, which he still continued to afford him, with some 



222 THE BARBER OF BANTRT. 

restraint, however, on liis favourite inclinations, as Mf. 
Tobin's character obliged him to maintain some degree of 
decorum towards his old foes, a circumstance which many 
thought would prey upon his health. 

Besides these were Will Buffer, so named for his pro- 
digious strength of limb and wonderful agility of muscle, 
which almost enabled him to realise the fables of Fleet- 
foot in the fairy tale ; and Mr. Dungan, Frank's old 
tutor, whom his grandmother had engaged for no other 
reasons, according to their humble neighbours, who are 
often as shrewd as their superiors, than that "he was just 
as cracked as she was herself. He had some strange 
notions about the pronunciation of the letter C, which had 
gone against him all through life, but which he would 
rather die than surrender. 

Such were the principal individuals of the company, 
whom Mr. Moynehan was asked to meet to-night at 
Castle Tobin. 

lie was received with a tumult of delight, Frank Tobin 
undertaking, when they had sat down, to make him ac- 
quainted with the people in the room. 

" That's Will Buffer sitting near my uncle. Did you 
ever meet Will Buffer before ? He's one of the ablest 
fellows in Ireland. I saw him lift a deal table with his 
teeth. He can somerset over his horse. You never saw 
such a smart fellow. He can run like the wind". 
" And who is that next your father ?" 
"That! Oh, that's Tom Goggin. You'll soon know 
who Tom Goggin is. He's a great wit. You never heard 
a fellow tell such stories, nor say such good things, as 
Tom. He'd make you split your sides laughiug, listening 
to him". 

There was something in the appearance of Tom Goggin 
and the Buffer, which Mr. Moynehan did not altogether 
relish, nor was his prejudice removed by the manners of 
both in the course of the evening. The Buffer was one of 



THE BARBER OF BAN'l'KY. 22'. 

those characters occasionally to be met in the Ireland of 
that day — rare, we believe, in onr own. He had just 
enough of the gentleman in his appearance to form a con- 
venient mask for the bully, which was his real character. 
With an appearance of hot-headed impetuosity, he had un- 
derneath a low and selfish cunning. He knew perfectly to 
whom he might be rude, and in what quarter his ignorant 
contradictions might be hurled with impunity; but no one 
had ever caught him playing off the bully towards any one 
who was capable of affording him a dinner and bed, or 
from whom he might at any time calculate upon a sea^i n- 
able loan of money. With such persons he was content 
to be a good-humoured and unresisting companion ; — a 
degree of servility for which he compensated to his wounded 
pride by unprovoked and invariable insolence to all those 
individuals from whom he expected nothing, because tdev 
had nothing to afford. Incapable, either by any natural 
or acquired superiority of mind, of attracting the attention 
of a well-educated circle, he usually opened his conversa- 
tion by a direct contradiction of the last speaker, always 
provided the last speaker were not a person from whom he 
had anything to hope for. 

Nor was the wit in the least degree more prepossessii g. 
Tom Goggin's forte was a horse-laugh ; it was almost all 
that he could do in the way of social communion, and, 
accordingly, his single faculty was put to frequent use. He 
might be said to have laughed his way through life. 
Whenever he said what he meant for a good thing, he 
chorused the effort with a hearty laugh, and his companions 
had gradually fallen into the habit of joining him, until at 
length he got the reputation of a wit. Probably his hearers 
thought no one had a better right to know what a joke 
was worth than the mnn who had maae it. Bat Tom 
Goggin's faculty of hiughing served him in many other 
ways. It was just as useful to him in applauding another's 
joke as in procuring sympathy for his own. If Tom had 



224 THE BARBER OF BANTRY. 

injured yonr repntation, and that you remonstrated with 
him about it, lie laughed until it became almost impossible 
to avoid joining him. If he had purloined your great coat 
or umbrella by way of joke, and you reclaimed your pro- 
perty, he would laugh, and laugh, and laugh, until you 
gave up all hope of getting an answer from him. If you 
were fool enough to lose temper, and set about chastising 
him, Tom would still laugh, and it was ten to one, if you 
were not on your guard, but he would have the whole 
country laughing at you too. 

Notwithstanding all this fun, there was something, as 
we have said, in Tom's countenance which the tax-gatherer 
did not relish. There was more, he thought, of meanness, 
than of either good-humour or good-nature, in all his 
laughter, and whilst he observed the half-knowing Jeer 
which he sent around the room as he gave vent to one of his 
good things, he felt less inclined to laugh, than to exclaim 
with honest Dogberry : " Friend, hold thy peace ; I do uot 
like thy look, I promise thee". 

The evening, nevertheless, rolled pleasantly away, *nd 
the tax-gatherer was tempted more than once to overstep 
the bounds which he had prescribed to himself on leaving 
home. For a long time, however, he restrained himself, 
nor was it until late that habit and the occasion overcame 
his prudence. It was observed that when he had done so, 
although he soon entered fully, and even wildly, into the 
revel spirit of the night, there was something strange and 
peculiar in his manner during the whole evening. He wa# 
fitful in his mirth, and his loudest and most boisterous 
bursts of hilarity were succeeded by long fits of absence 
and absorbing silence, as if he were on the eve of some 
enterprise, in which the fortunes of his life were interested. 

The truth was, that the recollection of his gold, the 
warnings of his wife and Rick, aud his prejudice against 
the ne*v guests, to whom he had to-night been introduced, 
made Moynehau anxious to see the money safe at TipsjF 



THE BARBER OF BANTRT. 225 

Hall. Accordingly, about midnight, and In the midst of a 
wild bacchanalian uproar, he astonished his host and 
bottle-companions by suddenly rising, and declaring his 
intention of going home. Never did a proposition excite 
more general indignation. Never had so pleasant a party 
been so unexpectedly broken up. Tom Goggin had never 
been so happy; Will Buffer ha 1 given three somersets, 
and kicked the ceiling with his heels ; and Ned Stokes, a 
capital fellow, who was at every party because he knew 
how to sing a comic song, was just going to give them 
" The Irish Schoolmaster". He had actually begun, 

Misther Byrne was a man 

Of a very grate big knollidge, 
Ad' behind a quickset hedge 

In a bog he kept his college, 

when the tax-gatherer rose. Everybody strove to dissuade 
him. 

" Why, 'tis blowing a perfect storm", said Mr. Tobin. 

" And that mountain road", exclaimed Frank, " wiiere 
robberies are as common as — as — anything". 

" I — ca — can't help it — I must be home to-night", ex- 
claimed Moynehau, endeavouring to resist the rising deli- 
rium that was already making inroads on his reason, and 
affecting an air of great industry and seriousness. " I 
have some accounts to make up that must be ready for the 
post to-morrow ". 

" If you have any loose cash about you, sir", said 
Goggin, rolling his eye about the room, and winking on the 
company, " I'd advise you to let me take care of it for 
you". 

In the burst of laughter which followed this effusion Mr. 
Muynehan left the room, followed by the Tobins, who con- 
tinued in vaiu to represent to him, with all the force of 
language and of argument which the glass had left them, 
the dangers of a solitary journey through the mountains at 
bo late an hour. It was in vain, likewise, that the wind 
10* 



226 THE BARBER OF BANTRT. 

dashed in the door as soon as the latch was raised, witb 
such force as to extinguish all the lights they had bronght 
into the hall, and almost to destroy the tottering equili- 
brium of the tax-gatherer. He seemed determined to 
make up by obstinacy for the deficiency of argument, and 
resolved, at all events, to undertake the journey. But- 
toning up his great coat to his chin, and shaking the 
hand3 of his companions and his host with vehement cor- 
diality, he sprung upon his mare, and with a wild halloo, 
dashed forward through the stormy night gloom. For 
some minutes the revellers stood to hear the shout repeated, 
and the tramp of the horse's hoofs growing fainter in the 
distance, until it had ceased to reach their ears. Soon 
after the company broke up, the Buffer and Tom Goggin 
riding off together. 

The next morning the tax-gatherer's horse was found 
without a rider, at a little distance from his house, and the 
saddle-cloth and bridle had the marks of blood. The truth 
was at once disclosed to the perplexed and agonised widow, 
for so she was already deemed. Mrs. Moynehan acted on 
the occasion with more firmness and resignation than 
might have been expected from her. She caused the 
most thorough search to be made along the line of roads, 
and through the fields and bogs, that lay between their 
honse and Castle Tobin. Every bog-hole was dragged, 
and every corner ransacked, but in vain. A woman of 
strong mind and deep affections, the shock to Mrs. Moyne- 
han was proportionally violent. 

44 Look, Edmond", she said, holding up the bloody 
housing, and looking with agony on her orphan child as 
he entered her apartment, " look at all that is left us of 
your father". 

The boy started for a moment, as if at a loss to com- 
prehend her meaning. 

" My dear child", said the widow, 4t let what is our 
ruin be at least your warning. Your father,, who left 



THE BARBER OF BANTRT. 127 

home yesterday in perfect health, will never now return to 
us again. He has been murdered on his road". 

The boy turned pale and red by turns, as he looked 
from the saddle-cloth to his mother's countenance, and 
said at last in a whisper : 

" By whom, mother ?" 

" Heaven only can tell that, and he who did it", said 
the widow. " Oh, it was an evil day for ns all, when he 
accepted that situation. Till then he was happy, good, 
and virtuous — he made all happy round him. But now — " 

At these words, and at the recollection of the altered 
life which her husband had been leading during his latter 
years, the unhappy woman swooned away, and was con- 
veyed to her apartment. Years rolled away, and the cir- 
cumstances attending the disappearance of the tax-gatherer 
remained enveloped in a darkness as deep as that in 
which he had set out on his last journey. A proclamation 
was issued from Dublin Castle, commencing with the 
usual : " Whereas, some evil-minded person or persons, 
etc.": and offering a reward of two hundred guineas for the 
detection of the murderer, but in vain. Whether he had 
been struck by lightning, stifled in a bog, torn to pieces 
(as some sage fair ones hinted) by evil spirits, or des- 
troyed by beings no less malignant of his own form and 
species, were questions that exhausted speculation and re- 
mained unsolved. The broken-hearted widow sought some 
consolation for the terrible stroke in devoting herself to 
the education of her son, whom she determined to bring up 
in the strictest principles of religion and virtue* 



CHAPTER VII. 

About fifteen years before this period, there stood, within 

a hundred paces of the outskirts of B , a house of 

moderate size, of which no living eye has seen a trace. It 



228 THE BARBER OF BANTRT. 

was tenanted by an humble barber of the name of O'Berne, 
Beside the dwelling stood a lofty elder, in which the mag- 
pie and the goldfinch built their nests. Behind was a 
garden, stocked with heads of cabbage, some rows of 
gooseberry and currant trees, with a few wall-flowers and 
marigolds of flaming yellow. A handsome pole, rising 
obliquely from the doorway, and bearing at its summit a 
tuft of hair that streamed upon the wind, annonnced to 
passengers the vocation of the owner. On either side of 
the entrance, two small plots sprinkled with the commonest 
flowers, and fringed with rows of London pride or bache- 
lors' buttons, gave grace and fragrance to the decent tene- 
ment. The thievish sparrow reared his noisy brood be- 
neath the eaves, and at evening, the robin would often 
siug his short and plaintive song amongst the elder boughs. 

The housfe of the barber, on Saturday evenings, afforded 
a lounge to many of the neighbouring villagers. Here, 
while O'Berne stropped his razors, or tucked a snow-white 
napkin under the grisly chin of some unwashed artizan, 
the many who waited to undergo a similar operation would 
lean against the well-scoured dresser, or take a hay- 
bottomed chair near the door, discussing politics, foreign 
and domestic, circulating the easy jest, or listening to the 
piquant anecdote. Amongst these persons there were few 
subjects on which the opinion of O'Berne had not conside- 
rable weight ; and few ventured to interrupt the current 
of his speech, while, as he raised the mollient foam, he 
would reveal to his wondering hearers the designs of many 
a potentate and minister, who fondly deemed them a secret 
to the world. 

The barber, as it was generally said, had migrated to 
this village from the south-western town of Bantry. It 
was in the tenth year of his only son, Godfrey, this remo- 
val took place. Soon after, chance threw the latter in the 
way of a singular education. One evening, during the 
first year of their residence at B , the barber was 



THE BARBER OF BANTRT. 229 

busy, as usual, in preparing his shop for the customers 
who generally dropped in when the business of the day 
was over. While thus engaged, an old gentleman entered, 
a white-haired, venerable looking man, but with eyebrows 
black as coal, and something in the expression of his dry 
and shrivelled features that was unaccountably repulsive 
and forbidding. It was not that he was morose, for his 
countenance wore a continual smile, and he seemed ever 
on the watch for something to jest about ; but sternness 
itself would have been more agreeable than this uncordial 
mirth. It was a dry and heartless levity, not genuine good 
humour ; and evidently indulged in, rather for the gratifi- 
cation of his own vanity than from a desire of affording 
pleasure to others. Seeing little Godfrey playing on the 
floor, he began to question him, and was so much enter- 
tained with the thoughtful solemnity of his answers, that 
he proposed, if the barber would allow it, to take him 
into his household. O'Berne feared to miss an offer 
of patronage which promised so much advantage to his 
son, and promised with many expressions of gratitude, 
to take him to the gentleman's house on the following 
day. 

The mansion was situated in a lonely and barren heath, 
about seven miles from the village. It was a bare, wdd 
looking edifice, occupying the centre of an enclosure (it 
could hardly be called a demesne), on which not a single 
branch of foliage \\ as to be seen, east or west, north or 
south, that could qualify in the least degree the natural 
dreariness of the place. The first impression of the scene 
sunk down like lead upon the mind ot the younger God- 
frey. A peasant, whom they overtook upon the road, and 
from whom they made inquiries respecting the proprietor, 
told them " that very little was known about him at all 
in them parts ; that he had no one livin' with him, only 
an ould woman that used to dress his food and do the 
kitchen work, and that it was said he was a foreigner ; but 



230 THE BARBER OF BANTRT. 

he was livin' there a good long while, and nothing wag 
ever known to his disparagement". 

They found the old gentleman within. Seeing little 
Godfrey rather low-spirited at the prospect before him, he 
took him into the library, which was pretty well furnished, 
.and took some pains to reconcile him to his uew abode. 

Here young Godfrey remained for six years, during 
which time his only companions, except when he went to 
spend a day at his father's, were the proprietor of the 
mansion, the old woman, and, far more entertaining and 
interesting to him than either, the books which burdened 
the shelves of the small library. Reading, likewise, was 
the constant occupation of his master. Seldom did he 
favour Godfrey with any conversation, and when he did, 
it was in such a brief and half-sneering style, that the 
latter did not lament his general taciturnity. Never had 
he heard of a man who lived so isolated — so entirely cen- 
tred in himself — as his new master. Nor while he secluded 
himself from all ordinary intercourse with the world in 
which he lived, was it for the purpose of devoting himself 
with more freedom to the concerns of another; for Godfrey 
never observed in his master any of those actions or ex- 
pressions, by which men are accustomed to intimate their 
recollections of a higher allegiance than any they owe on 
Earth. His patronage, however, and the leisure which he 
here enjoyed, enabled Godfrey O'Berue to lay up a store 
of information, which, though nearly useless, and in some 
points worse than useless, from want of method, was far 
more extensive than was usual in his station. The sudden 
death of his patron deprived him unexpectedly of those 
brilliant hopes to which his father looked forward with 
a sanguine eye. The recluse was found one morning in 
his bed a corpse, and Godfrey was recalled to the paternal 
threshold, as much in mystery with respect to the cha- 
racter and history of his late master as when first he 
entered his house. 



THE BAHBER OF BANTRT. 231 

In about a year after, the elder O'Berne himself being 
struck with his death sickness, sent for his son, who was 
at this time the only living member of his family. The 
latter, who was on a visit at the house of a friend in the 
neighbouring city, came without loss of time to receive the 
dying injunctions of his only parent. He found the latter 
seated in the arm-chair which was usually allotted to his 
customers, apparently awaiting the last stroke of death, 
and surrounded by a numerous crowd of relatives and 
friends. On seeing his son approach, he bade one of the 
men who stood near him, to unfix the pole, which was 
maile fast at the front door, and to bring it into the house. 
His wi.-hes Leing complied with, he took the pole in his 
right hand, causing it to stand erect upon the floor at his 
side, and addressed his son in the following words : — 

" This painted pole, Godfrey, is one o' the most ancient 
marks of our profession. It signifies that stick which, 
when the barber and the surgeon were the same, used to 
be held in their hands by the customers, and worked this 
way to make the blood come freer from the vein. This 
riband, that's tied at the top, signifies the bandage, and 
this stripe of red paint that goes coiling down the pole, 
the blood, as it were, flowing from the arm. This pole, 
Godfrey, has stood at my door, winter and summer, for 
five-and-forty years. I never possessed a half-penny but 
what it brought me, and I never wished for an estate 
beyond it. If you are satisfied with it, you are as rich as 
an emperor ; if not, the riches of an emperor would not 
make you so. Keep it, then, and be contented with it, 
and you will be happy". 

So saying, he placed the pole in the hand of his son, 
and soon after gave up the ghost. The latter interred the 
remains of his parent with all demonstrations of filial re- 
spect and piety, and entered presently afterwards upon the 
business and possessions he had left behind him. 

The younger Godfrey O'Berne had always been looked 



232 THE BARBKR OF BANTRV. 

upon in his neighbourhood as a kind of oddity. TaTl and 
ungainly in his figure, in his manner abrupt and sheepish, 
he was to far the greater number of his companions a sub* 
ject of jest and ridicule rather than admiration. There 
was, however, another circumstance which counteracted 
the effect of Godfrey's manner and appearance. He was 
a great student, and from various sources had contrived to 
amass a quantity of knowledge in a mind of no ordinary 
force. 

Were we to take opinions on the cause of O'Berne's re- 
serve and awkwardness, it is probable that we should find 
a great variety. Some would call it pride — some seusibi- 
lity — some modesty — and some, by way of being wiser 
than all the rest, might say, " it was a mixture of all 
these". Whatever was the cause, the young barber, un- 
like his fellow in the Arabian Nights, was reserved and 
meditative. He courted no friendships, sought no society, 
and seemed even impatient of that which he could nut 
avoid. Still he bore in mind his father's dying counsel, 
and, while he courted solitude as much as possible, he 
gave no one any actual reason to complain of him. 

The young barber felt a want which none of us, in 
whatever rank or station we may be placed, have failed to 
experience at some portion of our lives — the want of mental 
sympathy. There was no one in the village who shared 
his information, or who could understand his thoughts on 
any subject ; and it was not contempt, but the actual 
difference of miud, that made him unwilling to mingle in 
societies where he could find nothing of considerable 
interest to him. It so happened that the train of his 
reading was one peculiarly adapted to foster such con- 
templative habits. The works which fell into his hands 
related principally to moral and metaphysical subjects, and 
the barber, who had an acute, intelligent spirit, was deeply 
Caught by the profound and absorbing disquisitions which 
those books contained. How could he who had been all 



THE BARBER OF BANTR1I. 233 

the preceding evening engaged in arduous endeavours to 
comprehend the reasonings of various philosophers on the 
connection of mind with matter, and the mysterious manner 
in which both seem blended in the human individual, be 
expected on the following day to take an active interest in 
the labours of a mechanical vocation, or in the vulgar 
sports that made the village echo near his dwelling? 
There is no fact, however, more notorious than the 
possibility of uniting an extensive knowledge of, and the 
liveliest interest in, moral studies with a very inferior 
course of moral practice. The pleasure which Godfrey 
took in such pursuits as we have described was one of a 
purely intellectual character; the heart had little or nothing 
to do with it. He pleased himself with the noble exercise 
which the subject afforded to the faculties of his under- 
standing, and thought little of deducing rules of practice 
from the sublime and immutable truths which he contem- 
plated. Satisfied to let his imagination roam through the 
boundless sea of being, he bestowed comparatively little 
thought on the necessity of fulfilling with exactness the 
part allotted to himself in the universal scheme, and used 
the light afforded him, rather for the gratification of an 
active spirit than for the direction of his course through 
life. His silence, however, and his habits of application, 
produced a strong impression of his learning on the rustics 
in his neighbourhood, and they looked on him as one of 
the profoundest scholars in the world. 

There lived at this time in B '■■, a family 

of the name of Renahan, who were looked upon as amongst 
the leading denizens of the place. Mary, the eldest 
daughter of the house, was, in her seventeenth year, con- 
sidered one of the wonders of the village. Her beauty was 
the subject of praise amongst the young, and her genuine 
piety and modesty amongst the old. Of the former, all 
had not the opportunity of judging, for Mary Renahan 
(who was too humble to aspire to the magnificence of a 



234 THE BARBER OF BANTRT. 

bonnet) took care never to appear unhooded in the pnblifl 
streets; and he who by any chance had seen her countenance, 
was accustomed to tell it as an adventure worth recording 
to his companions in the evening. Mary was rich, cheerful, 
and handsome ; it was therefore the subject of general 
amazement, when the rumour spread that she was about 
to become the bride of the poor, the melancholy, and the 
ungainly Godfrey O'Berne. 

Such, however, was the truth. Let who will divine the 
cause, the gay and gentle Mary Renahan gave up, without 
hesitation, her liberty and her affections into the hand of 
one who was regarded by the rest of her companions 
either with ridicule or fear. 

From the day of his marriage, Godfrey O'Berne seemed 
to have renounced his speculative habits, and became 
practically industrious. He was attentive to his business, 
and began to laugh and jest with his customers in such a 
manner as to remind them of his father. To him belonged 
the economy cf the basin and the strop, the scissors and 
the curling iron. His part it was to amuse the m'nds, 
while he trimmed the whiskers of his customers; and to 
enlighten the interior of the heads that came beneath his 
hand, while he reduced the outside to the standard of 
fashion and of grace. The regul ition of the domestic de- 
partment was committed exclusively to the management 
of Mrs. O'Berne, who was as attentive to the minor 
affairs of the little establishment as she was to the 
happiness and comfort of her lord. An over -rigid 
economy, however, was not the fault of either master or 
mistress ; and while custom increased, and comforts mul- 
tiplied, the case was exactly the reverse with the hundred 
pounds which the latter had brought her husband as a 
dowry, and which they had set apart at first, in order 
that it might perform for their eldest daughter the same 
good office which it had done for Mrs. O'Berne. 

Siill all waa gay and happy at the barber's. As a 



THE BARBER OF AANTRT. 235 

husband and a father he had more than the average share 
of happiness, and less than the average share of care. 
His wife seemed well contented with the portion of en- 
joyment wliich their means afforded her; and his three 
children were promising in mind and frame. Mortimer, 
the eldest, conld already make a decent " pothook" in his 
copy-book, and the others knew as much of letters as 
Cadmus himself at twice their age, or as Charlemagne is 
said to have done while he was shaking Europe from the 
Baltic to the Alps. 

Occasionally, in the long summer evenings, Godfrey- 
would take down his violin, on which he was a tolerable 
proficient, and in the absence of professional employment, 
enliven the house with some old national air, to which his 
wife would sometimes add the melody of a tolerable voice. 
More frequently they would devote the evening to a walk 
through the village, where their decent appearance at- 
tracted general notice. Indeed they were not without 
being censured for over daintiness of dress by some of 
those sharp-eyed individuals, who, when they can oiscover 
nothing to ridicule in a neighbour's meanness, had rather 
find the contrary fault than let him pass unwounded. 

Nor were these the only annoyances from which the 
comforts of the barber received a slight alloy. That class 
of young persons inhabiting the purlieus of most towns 
and villages, who are emphatically distinguished by the 
epithet of '"the blackguards", seemed, with that mis- 
chievous instinct which enables men to distinguish what 
is ludicrous in human avocations, to have marked out 
O'Berne for their special amusement. Sometimes they 
would snatch a new toy or wedge of bread from the hands 
of his children as they stood gaping at the open door ; at 
others, they chalked uncivil nick-names on his pannels ; or 
else (and this was the unkindest cut of all) a whole gang 
of them would watch an opportunity when he and his wife 
were walking in all their finest through the village on a 



284 THE BARBER OF BANTRY. 

Snnday evening, and set up in fall chorus the popclai 
ballad:— 

Mnllins the barber grew so grand, 

lie listed in the Sligo band ; 

Mullins the barber grew so great, 

Tie knocked his nose against the gate, etc 

But notwithstanding these unavoidable mortifications, 
peace still abode on the household of O'Berne, and the 
tranquillity of his mind received no worldly shock that 
could bear an instant's comparison with the sum of his 
enjoyments. 



CHAPTER VIII. 

It wag on Saturday evening, and the shop was thronged, 
as usual, with a crowd of hairy heads, and chins as rough 
as hedge-hogs with the stubble of the week. On the 
operating chair sat Molony, the blacksmith, the napkin 
tucked beneath his massive jaws, and his chin already 
white from ear to ear, adding a twofold grimness to the 
smoke and ashes that encased the upper portion of his 
countenance. A thoughtful silence for some time pre- 
vailed, while the eves of all watched with a lazy admi- 
ration the skill with which the barber's razor flew along 
the blacksmith's spacious jaws, demolishing, at eveiy 
stroke, a long flourishing harvest, and leaving behind it a 
fair and glossy surface. At length, Mac Namara the 
carpenter, who was one of the village dandies, and waited 
to have his hair brought into form, broke silence as 
follows : 

" Well, of all de tings dat ever was done to me, dat's 
de last I could ever bear — to have anoder man shave me. 
Not meanin' de laste aaparagement to Mr. O'Berne, nor to 
hi« profession eider — but de iday of anoder man takin' 



THE BARjiER OF BANTRT. 137 

m« be de nose, an' sweepin' a razhure ip me troat, is 
what I never could abide de toughts o' doin' ". 

" When you have a beard at all, Tom Mac", said 
O'Reilly the cooper, taking a pipe from his mouth, and 
looking over his shoulder at the speaker, " it may come 
to your turn to talk of shaving it". 

"Surely, surely, Ned. Well den, it's come to your 
turn to talk of it, any way, and to do it — for I declare 

dere isn't a chin in B stands more in need o' de 

razhure". 

" Thrue for you, Tom. There's this difference betune 
you an' me, — that you shave to get a beard, an' I shave to 
get rid of it". 

The conversation dropped, but there was a portion of it 
which was not forgotten. A weak imagination is easily 
impressed. With all his learning and capacity, it was 
long before O'Berne could get rid of the horrid idea which 
was suggested by the carpenter's random words. His 
mind, though well enough supplied with knowledge, was 
not subdued to any wholesome discipline; and such minds 
are often the prey of every wandering fancy. From 
time to time he would start as the foolish thought sug- 
gested itself to his imagination, and shudder, as if the 
carpenter's words showed anything more than an ex- 
travagant caprice. 

Still these were weaknesses known only to himself, and 
his general prosperity continued unabated. Most minds, 
as well as bodies, have their peculiar constitution, and 
their peculiar ailment or " idiosyncrasy", which it requires 
the hand of a nice and delicate counsellor to deal with. 
Instead of despising the crowd of morbid thoughts, which, 
arising like clouds, would gradually overshadow his whole 
imagination, as he dwelt on those expressions of the car- 
pente., O'Berne encouraged, examined, and brooded on 
them, until at length they communicated something like 
a settled tinge to his whole character. Could such 



238 THE BARBER OF BANTRT. 

individnals be brought to understand how much of misery 
they might avoid by a moderate degree of habitual and 
generous self-restraint, the world would be spared a great 
deal of woe, and more, perhaps, of crime. 

To this state of mind an accidental circumstance added 

a prodigious force. At a little distance from B , 

there resided a family of the name of Danaher, hovering 
between the frontiers of gentility and of that rank to 
which the O'Bernes belonged. They lived in an equivocal 
looking house which they dignified with the title of Rath 
Danaher, held a pew at the chapel, and were looked upon 
as a kind of " half-quality". As they were near relations 
of Mrs. O'Berne, the latter and her husband were oc- 
casionally guests at the Rath, and contributed on festival 
days to make the evening pass merrily away. At this 
period the clouds of superstition still rested like a gloomy 
fog upon the minds of the poorer peasantry (as they do in 
all countries where education is retarded), nor were there 
wanting some in the rank immediately above them who 
participated in their credulity. In all such fancies, the 
Danahers were, from first to last, profoundly versed. 
They wore charms and spells; they never began a journey, 
or a new piece of work, on a Saturday ; they kept no 
pigeons about the house ; they would not hurt a weazel 
for the world ; they always took off their hats when a 
cloud of dust went by them on the road ; they read 
" dhrame-books" and consulted fortune-tellers, and prac- 
tised numberless rites of the most absurd and unmeaning 
kind. Night after night, when the fire blazed cheerfully 
upon the hearth, it was their wont to gather round it in 
a circle, and interchange their gloomy tales of supernatural 
agency, while even the youngest members of the group 
were suffered to drink, undisturbed, at the foul and sonl- 
empoisoning stream, that flowed from the hag-ridden ima- 
g uwtions of the story-tellers. Ghosts, fairies, witches, 



THE BARBER OF BANTRT. 239 

murderers, and demons, glided with a horrid and hair 
stiffening influence through all their narratives, and wheu 
the listeners retired for the night, it was to hurry to their 
beds with alarmed and slmddering nerves, and to snpph 
the frightful fancies of their waking moments by still more 
frightful dreams. 

One evening, while a conversation of this kind pro 
ceeded at the fireside of Rath Danaher, the O'Bernes were 
of the company. Godfrey, surprised at the extent to 
which they carried their superstitious credulity, undertook 
to disabuse them of their fears. He talked learnedly of 
the nature of spirit and of matter of second causes, and 
of the absurdity of supposing that the Divine Being would 
suffer the ordinary laws of nature to be violated on occa- 
sions so fantastical and useless. 

"I do not know how to make you understand", said he, 
" that such an event could not happen without a direct 
infraction o the present order of things, which is a 
miracle to be wrought by the hand of Omnipotence alone. 
That it may happen, as He who made the law can alter 
it, I do not offer to deny ; but to believe that it does 
commonly happen, and without cause or meaning, is to 
turn the exception into the rule. Spirit, as it is an im- 
material substance, has neither colour, nor sound, nor 
smell, nor any quality which can make it perceptible to 
our senses. Granting that they exist in myriads around 
us, it is still impossible, according to the ordinary laws of 
nature, that they can do us either physical injury or 
physical good. What communion they may hold with 
the mind, as that is likewise immaterial, has nothing to 
say to the purpose. It is possible they may suggest either 
good or evil to the soul (as religion even teaches us they 
do) ; bat that, without supposing a miracle, they can 
pinch the body black and blue, transport it from place to 
place, affright the senses with extraordinary sights and 
Bounds, is against the common order of nature. The 



240 THE BARBEH OF BAKTRY. 

Deity must clothe them with material faculties before they 
can produce material effects". 

" Well, Mr. O'Berne", said Robert Danaher, a ) oung 
man, who, having attended a course of surgical lectures 
in Dublin, conceived himself entitled to his share of 
authority on metaphysical questions, and who was, more- 
over, perhaps the only person present who understood 
half what the barber said — " I do not know that any 
miracle at all is necessary to the purpose. It is an un- 
disputed fact, that spirit does act on matter. The Deity, 
who is a pure spirit, sustains all things, both material and 
the contrary, in their daily courses — aud we know that in 
the human being, the mind directs and regulates the 
movements of the body at its pleasure. Why may not 
the spirit, separated from its clay, possess the same in- 
fluence over the matter that surrounds it, which it once 
held over that with which it was united in the human 
frame ? For my part, as it is a mystery to me by what 
means my will directs my arm to extend or to contract 
itself, I would not presume to say that the same spiritual 
will, when separated by death from this frame of flesh 
and blood, may not possess a similar influence over the 
wind that moans by my window, the candle that is burning 
on my table, or the silent air that favours my miduight 
slumbers. I know not how the effect is produced in the 
one case any more than in the other; but when I know 
that the one effect does take place, I should be far from 
asserting that it would require an infraction of the natural 
harmony to produce the other". 

" Ye may talk as ye will", said Kitty Danaher, " but 
fractions or no fractions, the spirits are abroad as regular 
as the sun goes down. Our John can tell you that, on a 
market night last year, after selling some cattle in New 
Auburn, he was mounting his horse at the door of the 
Harp aud Shamrock, when three times, one after another, 
he fell over on the other side,, without oue near (that he 



THE BARBER OF BANTRT. 841 

conld see) to give him a shove, and the poor old mare 
standing as quiet as a lamb". 

O'Berne, who supposed that there might be reasons for 
John's unsteadiness after leaving the Harp and Shamrock, 
a; art from outward agents, either spiritual or raaterial,- 
was not so much struck by this example, as he was by 
the argument which it seemed intended to illustrate. He 
remained for a long time silent, while each of the family 
in turn poured out some fearful tale of supernatural agency 
in order to subdue his incredulity. They did not, however, 
succeed in convincing him. rie continued to express his 
contempt for the ridiculous legends that they sought to 
thrust upon him, admitting only the possibility of such 
appearances as formed their leading subject. 

" I can assure you of one circumstance, at all events", 
sair! Mrs. Danaher, "which took place beneath this very 
ioof. Mr. Andrew Fiuucane the apothecary, to whom 
Kuuert served his time, was speaking one night, as you 
are, of the folly of believing in such stories, when we all 
warned him to be careful of what he said, as he did not 
know the moment he might have reason to change his 
mind. He laughed, but when he woke next morning he 
found himself lying with his head where his heels ought 
to be". 

This tale brought on a fresh torrent of similar anec- 
dotes. The evening passed away, and the barber and his 
wife returned home. It was in some weeks after, that the 
former, returning late from the neighbouring city, was ob- 
liged to take a bed for the night at an iun on the roadside. 
The stillness of the night and the loneliness of the place, 
for it was situate in one of those dreary flats which the 
road traversed on its way to the western coast, and 
tenanted only by an old woman and her son, brought to 
his recollection the discourse which had passed in his 
presence at Rath Danaher. The instinct of the super- 
natural is one, which perhaps nobody, except some 
11 



242 THE BARBER OF BANTRT. 

conscience-seared criminal, wliose heart is hard to every 
natural feeling, can ever wholly lay aside. It is implanted 
in us for the best of purposes, and though we may abuse 
it, as we do the best emotions, to our ruin, it is not the 
less intended for our good. O'Berne, though he had his 
weakness, was by no means superstitious ; yet he could 
not avo : d bearing testimony in his own heart to the ex- 
istence of the universal instinct as he gazed through his 
small window upon the wide and starlit heath that lay 
before it, and which was, in itself, a prospect sufficient to 
have awakened lonesome and melancholy thoughts. Still 
feeling a contempt for such terrors as those which preyed 
upou the household of Rath Danaher, he confessed, how- 
ever, a sufficient, degree of nervousness to lock the door of 
his sleeping room inside, and to make fast the window, to 
make " assurance doubly sure". He then knelt down, as 
usual, prayed with somewhat more than usual earnestness, 
and went to rest. His sleep was sound and dreamless as 
the sleep of a weary man is wont to be, but a surprise 
awaited him in the morning which made him almost doubt 
the evidence of his senses. On opening his eyes, he was 
astonished to perceive that the window which, when he 
went to rest, stood behind the head of his bed, and a little 
at the side, stood now directly opposite, as if it had made 
a circuit of the chamber in the night! He rose, and his 
perplexity increased. He found himself now lying with 
Ins feet towards the head of the bed, the pillow and all 
the bed furniture being reversed in the same way, and 
even his silver watch still lying as he had placed it under 
the bolster, but having participated in the general change 
of position. His astonishment was excessive. The bed 
had no appearance of the disturbance which such a change 
might be expected to make. It even seemed as if he had 
slept without motion through the night ; and but that his 
recollection of the contrary was distinct, he would have 
been persuaded that the whole must be an error of his 



THE BARBER OF BANTRT. 243 

mm. The door was locktd, and the window fastened, aa 
he had left them, but in no place could he find his clothes, 
which he liad laid on the preceding night upon the chair 
at his bedside. A "let thoroughly searching the room 
without success, he was about to summon the people of the 
house, in order to make inquiries from them, when his 
eye fell upon the old portmanteau which he had brought 
wiih him from home. It seemed more full than it had 
been when he took it off his horse on the preceding eve. 
He opened it. Wonder on wonder! There was the suit 
folded, brushed, and made np with an exactness that was 
admirable! Every article was in its place, and every 
buckle made fast with just the proper degree of tightness. 
The barber was perfectly bewildered. The mysterious 
ajjent, whose prerogative he had disputed in the case of 
Mr. Andrew Finucane, had sought an opportunity of 
vindicating, in his case also, the slighted power that was 
allotted him. So would the Danahers have construed 
the story ; and for that reason, the barber determined for 
the present to say nothing of the circumstance to them or 
to any body else. 

For many months the circumstance continued unex- 
plained, and its impression, from the very force of constant 
thinking on it, began to grow faint on the barber's mind. 
Again there was a party at llath Danaher, and again the 
barber and his wife were of the number of the guests. 
The conversation on this evening happened to turn on the 
superstition of the Fetch, or warning spirit, which shows 
itself, say the country people, in the likeness of some 
person doomed to die, at some short period before his 
death.* Numberless instances were related of such ap- 
pearances, and again Mr. O'Berrie expressed his total 
incredulity. In a fortnight after, as he was passing 

* Our friend Mr. Barnes O'Hara has given such celebrity to 
this supersiLion, that there is no need of a more particular descrip- 
tion. 



244 THE BARBER OF BANTBT 

through B , he was met by Mr. Guerin (the fathei 

of Peter Guerin, whose exploits at " the great Hoose' 
the reader will find in another volume). He was sur- 
prised to see that Mr. Guerin, with whom he was always* 
on the most friendly terms, now passed him by with an 
offended air. Nor did he make his appearance as usual 
on Saturday evening at the barber's shop, in order to have 
his beard and hair made decent for the ensuing Sabbath. 
A neighbour solved the mystery. 

"Why, Mr. O'Berne", said he, "Peter Guerin says 
there's no spakin' to you now, you're grown so grand". 

" I had much the same complaint to make of himself", 
replied the barber. " He wouldn't speak to me in the 
street when I saluted him". 

" That's dhroll !" said the peace-maker. " It's the very 
account he gives o' you. He says that he was standin' at 
his shop doore th' other morning about six o'clock, just 
afther day brake, an' that you walked by, lookin' him 
straight in the face, an' without ever takiu' any notice, 
although he axed you how vou was as plain as 
could be". 

The instant the man had concluded his account, 
O'Berne recollected the recent conversation at Rath 
Danaher. He had not, he knew, for years before been 

in B , or any where outride his own door at so early 

an hour as six in the morning ; and he had not the 
slightest recollection of the rencontre to which Mr. Guerin 
referred. What was it then that the latter had seen? 
The Danahers would have found a ready answer, and in 
spite uf himself he felt a creeping through his nerves as he 
remembered the prediction with which the appearance 
was supposed to be associated. He had sufficient promp- 
titude or mind, however, to keep his secret from transpiring, 

" Mr. Guerin may be sure", said he, " that he is the 

last man in B I would think of treating in that way. 

I have no recollection whatever of passing him by u.t any 



THE BARBER OF BANTRT. 245 

time in that manner, and I'm au-e I never had the least 
idea of doing such a thing". 

The village Mr. Harmony, wno received this expla- 
nation, lost no time in conveying it to the proper quarter, 
and peace was reestablished between the barber and his 
friend. In spite of himself, some occasional qualms res- 
pecting the state of his health, would cross the mind of 
the former, and this new adventure gave threefold strength 
to that already related. As time rolled by, however, and 
he found his bodily vigour undiminished, his courage rose, 
and he began to make inquiry respecting the nature of the 
superstition. It was then he learned for the first time, 
that the appearance, when seen early in the morning, was 
supposed to predict a long life to the individual whose 
semblance is assumed. 

There is no time when one is more inclined to admit 
the truth of a supernatural prediction than when it coin- 
cides exactly with one's own desire. The barber would not 
directly admit, even to himself, that his incredulity was 
shaken in the least degree, but it was certain that his 
repugnance to conviction in this instance was not so vivid 
as in the former. 

Half a year had passed away, before the spirit which 
had tormented him at the lonely inn on the roadside took 
any pains to conlirm the impression which had been made 
by its first essay. It happened one night that the barber 
slept at Rith Danaher, where he had turned in from a 
violent storm of rain and wind. The chamber which was 
allotted to him commanded a lonely prospect of the river 
and distant mountains, and the barber was forcibly re- 
minded of the adventures of the last night he had spent 
away from home. In the same manner as he had done on 
the former night, he fastened the door and window-frame 
before he went to rest. Whether it was owing to 9 
growing doubt of tiie reality o<" such appearances, or a 
state of bodily indisposition, it was a long time now 



246 THE BARBEK 01 BANTRT. 

before he could sleep. When he did so, however, h'u 
6leep, as usual, was sound and dreamless. 

After midnight, he awoke with a sense of cold. The 
bed-clothes had all disappeared ! Nothing but the gray 
striped tick remained upon the bedstead, and on that he 
lay, exposed to the sharp cold of a November night. By 
the aid of some embers which still were burning on the 
hearth, he was enabled to light a small candle, which he 
had extinguished on going to rest. He searched the room, 
but the fugitive bed-clothes were nowhere to be seen. It 
was impossible that this could be a trick of any human 
being. Tlie door and window were fast as he had left 
them, and even if it were possible for any body to have 
got in, the fact that he should have been thus annoyed, at 
two different houses, of which no one member perhaps 
knew even the existence of the other, was in itself in- 
credible. He was on the point once more of giving up 
the search, when his attention was directed to an old oak 
press which stood in a corner of the room ; it was locked, 
but the key was in the lock. The barber opened it, and 
could scarcely believe his eyes ; there lay the objects of his 
search, folded and laid upon the shelves with as much 
order and exactness as if they had never left the draper's 
counter. The barber was thunderstricken. He felt no 
terror, but he was stunned to the very soul ; he walked, 
he struck his breast, he moved the candle to and fro, in 
order to be satisfied that it was not all a dream. But 
nothing could change the facts, and with a bewildered 
mind he laid the clothes upon the bed again, and passed 
the remainder of the night in troubled and interrupted 
^lumbers. 

In the meantime, perplexities of a less metaphysical 
kind began to darken on the fortunes of the barber; and 
in common with his species he felt in his turn the influence 
of those inferior causes, to which for its own wise ends all- 
curbing Providence seems often to abandon human in* 



TIIE BARBER OF RANTBT. 247 

(crests. A handsome house had been erected on the 
opposite side of the road, about half-way between the 
barber's dwelling and the village, and speculation was 
exhausted as to its probable use; some said it was 
intended for a toll-house, others for a shrine of Bacchus. 
Before the point could be decided a typhus fever confined 
O'Berne to his apartment and his bed, from which he was 
unable to rise during the space of a summer month. 
During this time (the first period of affliction which they 
had ever known), his wife attended him with a tenderness 
and care that excited in his mind a deeper sentiment of 
affection and respect towards her than he had ever felt 
before. What heart, be it high or low, that ever yielded 
to affection, has not, like that of the poor barber, experi- 
enced, either in its bitterness or in its consolation, the truth 
so delightfully sung since then by our national poet ? 

When we first see the charms of our youth pass us by, 

Like a leaf on the stream that will never return, 
When our cup, which had sparkled with pleasure so high, 

First tastes of the other — the dark flowing urn ; 
Then, then is the moment affection can swa}', 

With a depth and a tenderness joy never knew. 
Love nursed among pleasures is faithless as they ; 

But the love born of sorrow, like sorrow is true. 

Nor was the gratitude of O'Berne on iirst making this 
discovery, in its happier sense, less tender or less true that 
he was but a village barber. 

On the first day of his convalescence, a new, and it 
must be confessed, an unwelcome surprise awaited the 
invalid. Walking with difficulty to the low window, where 
his wife had placed a chair, lie looked out with strange 
and altered eyes upon the healthy active world, that still 
continued its career of growth, of bloom, and of decay, 
unchanging in design, though for ever varying in effects. 
The sun still smote the ripening grain ; the fresh wind 
shook the boughs ; the noisy carmen rattled by to 



JMiS THE BARBER OF BANTBT. 

market, and the smaller birds, which least of Nature's 
children seem known to sickness or to pain, fluttered with 
vigorous wing and frequent twitter about the leaves, and 
amid the branches of the rustling elder. 

But there was one sight, which, from the moment when 
it first had caught the barber's eye, diverted him from 
every other thought. The new house, above alluded to, 
had been completed and inhabited during his illness, and 
it was with astonishment and dismay he perceived that 
the inmate was no other than a rival barber. He could 
not without anxiety contemplate the superior splendour 
displayed by this new competitor. The front of the house 
was handsomely dashed; the pole, exceeding at least by 
half the size of O'Btrne's, was surmounted by a gilded 
ball that shone like another sun, while close beneath was 
fastened a long banner of hair that flouted the winds as 
if anticipating triumph. Above the lintel of the door 
was a sign board, executed in metropolitan style, which 
announced the proprietors (for it seemed to be a part- 
nership) as " Fitzgerald and O'Hanlon, late from Paris 
and Dublin, professors of bair-cntting and perfuming", etc. 

" Mary", said the convalescent to his wife, as he sur- 
veyed this great display, " why didn't you tell me there 
was a new barber set up since 1 lay down ?" 

" I didn't think of it", replied the wife ; " what matter 
can it be to us ?" 

" I'm afraid time will show us that", said O'Berne. 
" Wasn't Ireland big enough without their coming to 
plant themselves, and their pole, over-right my very 
door ?" 

''What signifies themselves and their great pole?" 
replied the wife. " You have your custom made, and the 
neighbours will stand by you, I'll engage". 

" That's not the way of the world", replied the barber, 
" and I'd be a fool if I thought it would be the way with 
me ; there are some I know I can count upon. There's 



THE BARBER OF BANTRY. 849 

lie blacksmith, because he has no capers that way, and 
he says no one knows the sweep of his jaws but myself* 
he'll stick to me ; and there's my third cousin, Pat Sheehy, 
the weaver, will stay by me for blood's sake ; and a few 
more friends I may be sure of; and perhaps others that 
will be honest, as some will be rogues, without expecting 
it; but the rest, you'll find, will have their notions. The 
golden ball will draw many an eye away, and where the 
eye goes, the chin and head will follow. But where's the 
use of talking ?" 

The event even outstripped the anticipations of the 
barber. The time lost by his own illness and that of 
his wife, who fell ill of the same disease immediately on 
his recovery, accelerated a catastrophe which he had too 
much cause to fear. The villagers were unwilling to 
frequent a house which 1 ad now for two months been the 
seat of contagion. Party spirit also lent its influence to 
the success of the new-comers, and O'Berne lost many a 
head and chin to political differences. 

In fine, before the lapse of many years, extreme and 
squalid misery descended on the dwelling of the barber. 
By degrees, retrenchment followed retrenchment, until 
what once were necessaries, assumed the character of 
luxuries too costly to be thought of. The barber and his 
wife no longer appeared abroad except when it could not 
be avoided, and at length that day was one of joy to the 
family which saw them supplied with a bare sufficiency of 
food. 

From circle to circle, however, they descended in the 
region of adversity, nor had they yet arrived at the depths 
of the abyss. The rent of their tenement ran into arrear, 
and they were menaced more than once with an ejectment. 
This was the only event which began to strike a real gloom 
into the mind of the barber, already weakened by mis- 
fortune and tie effects of sickness. While it startled 
every affection of his heart, it awoke in all its force (as the 
11* 



250 THE BARBZR Of BANTRT. 

heart in its alarm will often do) the full power of an imagi- 
nation that prosperity had lulled into comparative inaction. 

The barber, though he had received the same educa- 
tion, did not use it to the same advantage as his wife. It 
perplexed, while it soothed him, to observe the serenity 
with which his wife sustained the adverse change in their 
circumstances. She, who had sacrificed so much for him, 
did not even seem to be conscious that she had made any 
sacrifice whatever. Her wealthy relatives were now all 
scattered and burdened with their own separate claims, 
and could do nothing to assist the barber. Still, in their 
distress, her concern seemed all for her husband and her 
children. The sea is not more necessarily agitated by the 
sighing ot the winter wind*, than is a generous and re- 
ligious bosom by the accents of distress and sorrow in a 
fellow being. So natural, so free from effort or reluctance, 
appeared the affectionate concern with which the gentle 
Mary exerted herself to alleviate the sufferings of her 
husband and her children. 

At different times her gentle uncomplaining conduct 
produced varying effects upon her husband's mind. Some- 
times, when his reflections took a gloomy turn, the clear 
angelic serenity of her looks would, with an influence like 
that of gentle music, subdue his discontent, and restore his 
thoughts to calmness and to order; at others, when he 
beheld her sharing in their common want, and remem- 
bered what she was when she resigned abundance and 
respectability to unite her earthly lot to Iks, his anguish 
far exceeded what it was when he thought only of his own 
privations. 

" We are worse off now", he said to her, one summer 
evening, as they sat before, the open window which looked 
upon their little orchard, aiid watched the ciows winging 
high above them to tb.e distant wood ; " oar case is worse 
than that of even the animals that are left without reason, 
Vi.u .'ace of the round wivid is free to them ; from the worm 



THE BARBER OF BANTRf. 851 

Co the eagle, all are well provided for. The crow has his 
nest upon the bough, and the hare has her form in the furze, 
and their food is ready for them at morning in the fields, of 
by the river, for no trouble but the pains of seeking it. In 
the water, in the air, or on the earth, food, clothing, and 
a home, are ready found for all. The goldfinch has his 
painted feathers, and the robin his grain of seed, while our 
poor babes are perishing with cold and hunger". 

" For every pain we bear with true patience in this 
life", said his wife, " we shall receive an age of glory and 
of happiness in the next". 

" Yet who would murmur at a Providence that is in- 
scrutable", resumed O'Berne, in a fit of sombre musing ; 
" if men would only do their duty by each other ? But 
it is not, and it never will be so. They say that if you 
take a young bird unfledged from the nest, and set it 
down alone in some field far away, where the parents 
cannot find it, and leave it there and watch it, they say 
there is no bird that passes, of whatever kind, and hears 
its lonesome chirp, that will not bring it a worm, or a 
mouthful of some other food, until it gets strength to shift 
for itself. But men! men must have laws to force them 
even to do so much as will keep the breath of life within 
the lips of their own kind". 

" All is well", said Mary, " while we keep our own 
fidelity. Let the storm blow as it will, let all our pros- 
pects and our possessions go to ruin ; all still is well whilo 
Heaven is not offended. Let us keep our hands un- 
stained, and in His name who distributed suffering and 
joy, let the worst that will befall us. It is not want nor 
plenty that can either give or take away our peace of 
mind. To be contented with the will of Heaven, and to 
strive to put it into practice, is always in our power, and 
if we aro not so disposed in our distress, we may be 
certain that wc should noi be so under any change what- 
ever. Let us preserve our innocence, and all is well". 



258 THE BARBER OF BANTRT. 

" You are very easily contented", said the barber with 
an angry look. "What were your thoughts, two months 
since, when the fire seized on the grocer's house next 
door, and we saw, with our own eyes, the remains of an 
unhappy infant dug out of the ruins ?" 

" I will tell you, Godfrey, what 1 thought", replied his 
wife ; " I trembled for myself when I beheld it. He, 
said I, who has created the world so fair, and filled it 
with so many blessings, who has made that beautiful sun, 
and those millions of shining stars, and who daily and 
hourly shows his goodness and his mercy in new acts of 
kindness to his creatures ; he too it is who has permitted 
that sinless child to perish by a frightful death. Let me 
therefore take the warning, and beware in what condition 
I fall into his hands ; for if he thus afflicts the innocent 
and good on Earth, what should be done with us? I 
speak to you in this way, dear Godfrey, because I see you 
are beginning to sink in spirits. Beware, my dear, dear 
husband ; it is in our moments of gloom and melancholy, 
as well as in those of thoughtless gaiety, that the enemy 
of our* souls endeavours to seduce us into crime or 
madness". 

As she said these words she laid her hand caressingly 
upon her husband's shoulder. Moved by the action as 
well as by the words with which it was accompanied, 
O'Berne was softened, and melted slowly into tears. 

" Read to me", said he, " and it may be better". 

Ilis nife complied, and taking from the drawer a copy 
of the scriptures, began to read a portion of the New 
Testament. Godfrey listened, and it seemed to him as if 
he had never heard the words before. For several days 
after he became totally absorbed in the perusal of the 
volume ; the profound wisdom of its counsels, the majestic 
simplicity of its narrative, and the stupendous nature of 
the events which it recorded, the heartfelt spirit of prayer 
with which it was pervaded, the terrible solemnity of its 



THE BARBER OF DANTRY, B53 

tra .fiings, the melting tenderness of its promises, and the 
striking nature of the examples by which both were illus- 
trated, made a deep and strong impression on the mind 
of the village philosopher. It seemed to him as if he 
never before had heard how all things were first called 
into existence ; how murder entered first into the world, 
which, until then, was the abode of love and happiness. 
Be there heard the Deity delivering his law to man, amid 
the lightnings and the thunders of Mount Sinai ; he saw 
in the fate of Eli and his sons, an example of the divine 
justice against neglectful parents; he dwelt with enchant- 
ment on the mystical beauties of the story of Ruth and 
the marriage of Rebecca: and he traced with astonish- 
ment and awe, the tremendous and affecting history of the 
origin, the fall, and restoration of his species, detailed in 
language worthy of a subject so sublime. He read, and it 
astonished him to think how mechanical till now had been 
the nature of his feelings and his practice. What ! was 
he then one of those who really believed that the Divinity 
himself had come on Earth to teach his creatures, both 
by word and by example, the real nature of moral 
goodness ; to overthrow the worldly error which ascribed 
to human pride the honours due to virtue; and to introduce 
modesty, humility, patience, and mildness, to the same 
rank in human estimation which they had ever held in 
the divine, and which men till then accorded to false 
glory, ambition, revenge, and haughtiness of soul ? 

The philosophic barber, however, while he wondered 
how little hitherto he had felt the real nature of the cha- 
racter he professed in society, rather revolved these 
wonders in his intellect than let them sink into his heart. 
His imagination became deeply impressed, and he brooded 
by day and dreamed by night on what he had been 
studying, until his whole mind became absorbed with the 
one engrossing subject. To change the heart, it is not 
bumcient that the mind should be excited. To create a 



254 TTTE BARBER Of BANTRT. 

spirit 01 tenderness and love is of far greater importance 
in the way of virtue, than to captivate the fancy or amaze 
the understanding. 

The impatience, therefore, with which he bore the in 
creasing perplexity in his affairs, was not in any per- 
manent degree diminished. A week of extreme misery 
and privation was closed by a formal ejectment from the 
house in which he lived. We pledge ourselves not to the 
truth of the events of a few days and nights immediately 
su eet'ding, but relate them as they are told in the 
neighbourhood, reserving all comment to the conclusion of 
the tale. It was a Friday evening, and the family were 
to give up possession before twelve on the following 
Monday. With a mind weakened by distress and ap- 
prehension, the barber spent the day pacing alone from 
room to room of the little dwelling, like one distracted in 
his thoughts. 

" If it be trne", said he, striking his forehead with a 
burst of anger, — "if it be true, that immaterial things can 
hourly, as young Dauahcr asserted, exert an influence over 
what is passible and material, why will they not interfere 
to serve as well as to perplex and to annoy us? Why 
will not that power, whatever it may have been, that 
visited me for my discomfort in that lonely inn and at 
ltath Danaher, present itself again for my assistance, at a 
time when human aid has left me at my last extremity ?" 

His wife, who overheard those words, was afraid that 
her hut-baud's misfortunes were beginning to affect his 
reason. 

" Remember , she said, ' that apart from human aid 
we have but one source of power to which we can apply". 

" I would apply to ANY", cried her husband with a 
burst of frenzy ; " from whatever source assistance comes, 
I am ready to receive it". 

Saying this, he rushed rom the room. The fit of 
passiou having passed away, he was able to reflect with 



TK BARBER OF BANTRT. 355 

more distinctness on the nature of what he had said, and 
his imagination froze at the thought that it was possible 
he might yet be taken at his word. Terror, in addition 
to the former excitement, now seized upon his nerves, and 
unfitted him for any settled thought. He could only wait 
in hopeless silence the passing of the shocking gloom 
that seized upon his mind, without knowing how to 
quicken its departure. 

In this mood, say the story-tellers, he retired to rest. 
The chamber in which he slept looked out upon the 
orchard, at the door of which, some evenings before, the 
conversation already recorded had taken place between 
the barber and his wife. The bed was so placed that the 
former could see as he lay down, on a moonlight night, a 
considerable portion of the orchard and the country lying 
far beyond it. Such a night was that of which we speak ; 
it was between one and two o'clock, and in mid-winter, 
when after a few hours' slumber, the view of the orchard, 
with its moonlight paths, crossed by the sharply defined 
shadows of the trees, came slowly on his sight through 
the uncurtained window. 

For a time as he looked out upon the scene, the barber 
could not tell if he were waking or asleep, so indistinct 
and floating was the consciousness that existed in his 
mind. All doubt, however, ceased, or rather he ceased to 
question what his actual condition was, when he beheld a 
figure dressed in a grotesque suit of black, advancing 
through the trees and approaching the windows with a 
slow but steady pace. An unaccountable influence held 
the barber motionless, until the stranger approached so 
near that his singular drapery almost appeared to touch 
the glass. It seemed to the former as if an iron hand 
were laid upon his breast and pressed him to the bed. 
The moonlight falling on the back of the figure prevented 
him from seeing with distinctness what the features were 
of this unknown intruder, but the sense of horror which 



256 THE BABBEB OF BANTRY. 

his presence excited was almost insupportable. After a 
little time the figure slowly raised one hand, and retiring 
a little from the window, waved it gracefully at a sign 
for Godfrey to arise and follow. The sequel is gathered 
from Godfrey's own indistinct recollection of what took 
place. He could not, he said, resist the summons; he got 
np like one nnder the influence of some necromantic 
power, hastily drew on his clothes, and proceeding to the 
window, opened the sash and stepped out into the orchard. 
The figure retired, still turning at intervals, and beckoning 
MUh one hand until they had passed into the open country. 
On a sloping hill at the eastern side of the village stood 
a grove of firs, shadowing a tract of soil which once had 
been a bmying-ground, but in which no interment had 
taken place for centuries before. Tradition onk, and the 
half-obliterated remains that were sometimes dug out of 
the soil, supplied the history of its former uses, for 
neither monument nor grave-stone had for a long period 
been discernible upon the slope. Near the borders of 
this sombre grove it was that O'Berne beheld the figure 
panse and seem to wait his arrival. Still moved by the 
same irresistible influence, the barber pressed forward up 
the slope, fixing his eye upon the stranger, and even 
eager for the conference which he anticipated with a 
dizzy sense of terror, i r were his wonder and his awe 
diminished, when, on turning round to address him, the 
stranger revealed the countenance and figure of ids old 
maatei' 1 



CHAFfO IX 

v \ r E pnnue the barber's narrative as he fs saM to hav« 
delivered it 

" You said" (the stranger slowly and calmly enun- 
ciated each syllable, like one who utters words of the last 



THE BARBER OF BAOTBY. 257 

importance), " that you were ready to receive assistance 
from ANY source. I am one who have both the will and 
the power to afford it". 

" And who are you ? " the oarber would have said in 
turn, but his jaws, locked fast as if by a fit •> tetanus, 
refused to articulate the words. His guide, however, 
seemed to understand his thought. 

" Who I am", said he, with a voice so inexpressibly 
mournful that it penetrated to the hearer's soul, " is of 
no importance to your present views or mine. Let it be 
enough for you to know, and for me to tell you, that I 
can procure you the assistance you require. Speak there- 
fore, and tell what thou wouldst have". 

The barber replied at once : — 

" Food for my family and a certain home. They are 
miserable. If thou canst secure them sustenance and 
shelter, thou shalt have my gratitude". 

" I require it not", replied the figure with a smile of 
subtle scorn. " I seek not love but service. I have it in 
my power to do all aud more for thee than thou rcquirest, 
but no one offers wages without requiring a return. I 
offer then to relieve you from your present difficulty, but 
it is on one condition". 

" Name it", cried the barber. 

** It is a simple one", replied the spirit. " Those who 
are at war do not use to pay the servants of their Enemy. 
You must be one of us, if you would receive our aid". 

" What ! become like you an ODen enemv to the 
Divinity?" 

" Become like us". 

44 There is no step in crime or in calamity", replied the 
barber, "beyond an express and formal hatred of the 
Deity. I dare not accept of the condition". 

" Remain then as thou art, and serve in wretchedness", 

replied the fiend. " He whom thou servest has abandoned 

hee to want and woe Continue if thou wilt to worship 



258 THE BARdfifi OF BAN 1ST. 

a neglectful master instead of one who is willing to repay 
thee with abundance". 

" It may be", said the barber, " that he does but try 
my patience and my loyalty. This life is short : he may 
be bounteous in the next". 

" Feed on that painted hope if thou wilt'', replied the 
fiend, " and see if it will satisfy thy present misery. Did 
He not tell thee likewise that whosoever should forsake all 
things for Him in this world, should receive an hundred- 
fold even in the present life ?" 

"Aye", said the barber with a sigh, "but he meant in 
the sweets of a good conscience, which is a treasure 
beyond all that kings or emperors enjoy". 

" Well", said the spirit, " be content with that, if thou 
prefer it. If thou accept my offer, happiness and peace 
and plenty shall surround thee for the term of thy mortal 
life ; if not, afHiction, trouble, and necessity". 

" For my mortal life perhaps", replied the barber, " but 
how shall it be after?" 

" Why", said the fiend, " thou wouldst not look to be 
better than thy master". 

Godfrey was silent, and the spirit, after a pause, 
resumed : 

"To-morrow thou shalt have the choice of misery or 
joy. I do not press thee to decide at once. Whenever 
the extremity may be at hand, my power will not be 
distant". 

With these strange words he vanished, and the barber 
returned to his dwelling. Of his adventures on the way 
home, or the manner in which he obtained an entrance 
into his own house, he had no recollection. On the fol- 
lowing morning he found himself in his bed as usual, but 
could remember nothing of what took place from the 
moment of the spirit's disappearance. There were no cor- 
roborating signs in the position of his dress or in the state 
of the window, that bore testimony to the reality of his 



THE BARBER OF BANTRY. 259 

midnight excursion ; and he would have been incUned. 
notwithstanding the regular train of the occurrences, and 
the vivid impression he retained of what had passed, to 
pronounce the whole a dream, if it were not that the two 
former mysterious events which had befallen him, left his 
reason far more open to an admission of supernatural 
agency. 

The day which followed was the same in which, as set 
forth in a preceding portion of this narrative, Mr. Moy- 
nehan the tax-gatherer left home to dine at Castle Tobin. 
It was a trying one to Godfrey, on more than one account. 
Not one of the inmates of the dwelling had tasted food 
since they arose, and at night the cries of the younger 
children rent the father's breast To complete the 
dreariness and discomfort of the scene, the night was 
gusty and full of showers, and the sound of the inclement 
weather breaking against the doors and windows, seemed 
to give promise of the destitution which awaited them 
when they should no longer own the shelter of a roof. 

Emaciated even more by wasting thoughts than by the 
want of necessary food, the barber sat in the chair, which 
now but rarely held a customer, attending in silence (if 
he attended at all) to the consolatory expressions that 
were now and then addressed to him by his wife, and 
weaving vain conjectures on the future. 

"Talk you of comfort?" he said, looking backward on 
the latter with a ghastly smile. " Have you the wallet 
ready, then ? aud the wattle aud tin can ? and the slate 
and voster for Mortimer to study in the dyke on summer 
days, when we all sit down together by the roadside in 
the shade, away from the dust of the horses' feet and the 
carriage wheels, while we ask the gentlefolks for charitv 
as they roll by ? not forgetting the linen caps for the girls, 
and all the beggar's furniture ? Have you all that ready, 
lince you talk of comfort ?" 

" Even if it came to that", replied his wife, with a tone 



£60 THE BARBER OF BANTRY. 

of slight seventy mingled with affection, " J trust we all 
have resignation to endure it". 

"It would be less a burden to my mind", said the 
barber, " that you had asked me ' why I brought you to 
this misery?' ratlier than to hear you speak 30 kindly. 
And why, why did I do so ? Why did I not leave you 
where I found you, happy and prosperous in your father's 
house ?" 

At this moment one of the younger children which had 
crept from its pallet of straw, took Godfrey by the coat, 
and looking up with a pallid face and crying accent, 
said : — 

" Father, Ellen is hungry". 

If those who make themselves miserable about fancied 
evils, could kuow the pangs that rent the heart of 0' Berne 
at this instant, it is probable they would look upon their 
own condition with a more contented eye. In the agony 
oi his soul the unhappy man bent down his head, and 
half murmured between his teeth : — 

" If the opportunity now were offered me again, I 
would not, I think, reject it". 

He had scarcely framed these words in his own mind, 
wnen the tramp of horse's hoofs was heard approaching 
i he door, and soon after a loud knocking with a whip 
imidle made the panel echo through the house. 

"Hollo! ho! ho! Who's within? Open, I say I 
Berne, v e are you ? Are your razors ready T* 

44 They have got a new method of shaving, 
They have got a new method of shaving— 
Oh, I wouldn't lie under that rnzor, 
For all that lies under the sun. 

" O'Berne, I say ! Godfrey, bring out the light !' 
"Tis Mr. Moynehan the tax-gatherer's voice",, said 
■lary. 
" And drunk", added the barber, 
" May Heaveu forgive him !" 



THE BARBER OF BANTRT. 261 

" Why — O'Berne, I say ! Are you asleep ur deed ? 
Open ! open the door ! 

" Over the mountain and over the moor. 
Barefoot and wretched 1 wander forlorn, 
My father is dead, and m v mother is poor. 
And I weep for the days that will never return. 
Pity, kind gentlefolks 

" Come — come — barber, this is no joke". 

The door was opened, and Mr. Moynehan made bis ap- 
pearance, wrapped in a dark frieze travelling coat, which 
glistened with rain, as did the fresh and well-nurtured 
countenance of the owner. In one hand lie held the 
bridle of his horse, which seemed inclined to follow him 
into the house. 

" How are you ? how are you ?" said the tax-gatherer, 
as he staggered forwards, — "no compliments at all at 
present, do you see ? I'm come to stay the night with 
you, for 'tis rather late and windy". 

" You have chosen but a poor house for your lodging, 
sir", said the barber. 

'* No matter for that ; many a better fellow often slept 
in a worse. So that you find a dry corner for my horse, 
you may put myself anywhere, do you see ?" 

"Mortimer", said the barber, "take the gentleman's 
horse round to the little cow-house, and see him well 
rubbed for the night". 

"And hark you!" said the tax-gatherer, setting his 
arms akimbo, and endeavouring to keep his balance 
while he gazed on Mortimer, " before you do so, my young 
hero, give me that portmanteau that's fastened behind the 
saddle. That's right", he added, as the boy complied, 
" King George would have a crow to pluck with me if I 
let anything happen to them. And hark in your ear — 
another tiling — 1 took a glass too much at Castle Tobin : 
no matter — a set of rogues — They have their reasons for 
[t-mpting me to exceed". 



£62 THE BARKER OF BA.1TBT. 

"Mary", said the barber, "put the children to bed, 
amd shut the door". 

"Good night, Mrs. O'Berne — good night — And hark 
yon — Mrs. O'Berne, I see you're shocked to see me as I 
am, but 'tis my weakness, that and a little tender-heart- 
edness about the making out of an inventory — I confess it 
— if an honest, hospitable country gentleman sends me, 
in a goodnatured sort of way, a sack of corn for that poor 
animal abroad, and then omits all mention of his own 
neai riding nag, I haven't the heart to charge him with it. 
Good Mrs. O'Berne, I protest to you, there is not a single 
four-wheeled carriage, nor a gig, nor a riding horse in the 

whole neighbourhood of B . Those are all phantoms 

that we meet every day upon the roads — phantoms, ma 
dam — I have the best authority for it — the word of the 
owners themselves — all ghosts of grayhounds, ghosts of 
pointers, ghosts of spaniels, terriers, servants, and all. 
Oh! Mrs. O'Berne, there's nothing in the island but 
ghosts and rogues ! There's that attorney — no matter 
who — he's an honest fellow to be sure, and keeps a 
capital bottle of whisky : he had the assurance, last week, 
after putting blank, blank, blank, against horse-s, car- 
riages, and servants, to turn about as he handed me the 
paper, and offer me a ride in his own curricle as far as 
the village. And I protest to you, the ghost of a curricle 
carried us both uncommonly well. As for the great men 
of the county, I can't for the life of me tell how they 
manage with two hearths and six windows. There's a 
place that shall be nameless — I don't say 'tis Castle 
Tobin now — where I can count four-and-twenty windows 
as I ride, up the avenue ; but on entering I cannot per- 
suade Tob the owner I mean — that it is more than 
quarter the number. Assessed taxes ! assessed rogues 
and swindlers! But good night, these things must not 
continue — Pray for me, — your prayers, I think, are heard. 
As for tl at husband of yours — he deals in witchcraft". 



THE BARBER OF BANTRT. 263 

* Who ? — I ?" cried the barber, starting from a fit of 
gloomy musing. 

"• Ha, ha, ha ! observe how he starts. Look at him, 
Mrs. O'Berae. I would not trust my life with that 
fellow across the street". 

Godfrey gathered his brows and looked darkly on the 
ground. 

" Look at him", continued the tax-gatherer, laying his 
hand on Mrs. O'Berne's arm, and pointing with the other 
to her husband, who, in an attitude of ghastly anger, 
looked backward in his face. " There are men who go 
through life straight, like the handle of my whip ; and 
there are others that, like the lash, will take any crooked 
bend you give it. Look at him, how he eyes the 
portmanteau !" 

Again the barber started. 

" Ha, ha ! Come, come, O'Berne, I did but jest. You 
must learn to take a joke". 

Mrs. O'Berne retired, and the tax-gatherer remained 
with her husband in the kitchen. During the foregoing 
conversation, a dreadful struggle had been taking place 
within the mind of the latter. The gold ! Mr. Moynehan, 
in his random jest, had harped his thought aright. That 
portmanteau would secure his family for ever against all 
fear of indigence. Terrified by the workings of his own 
breast, and desirous to remove a temptation which he 
feared might grow too strong for his already flickering 
virtue, he approached the lax-gatherer, and said, with a 
hoarse and mournful energy of voice and manner : 

"Mr. Moynehan, it is as your friend 1 advise you to 
return home to-night. There are evil minds abroad, 
hearts weakened by affliction, and unable to resist the 
deadly thoughts that want and melancholy whisper to 
them in the silence of the night. Be wise, therefore, and 
return to your house at once". 

" Keturu to my house !" cried the tax-gatherer, setting 



264 THE BARBER OF BANTRT. 

both his hands upon bis sides, and looking on the barbs 
with a stare of high defiance. " And who are yon, sir, 
that order me to return to my house ? I shall stay where 
I am, sir, and you may frown and grind your teeth as you 
will, sir, but I shall not be ordered off by you. And I 
will tell yon more, I'll have myself shaved to-night ; so 
get your apparatus ready on the instant". 

" To-night", said O'Berne, " pray do not say to-night. 
It is already one o'clock". 

But Mr. Moynehan, like many who have not a perfect 
possession of their reason, was obstinate. He insisted on 
being shaved, and took his seat in the centre of the room, 
while the barber, with trembling knees, and a mind shaken 
to its foundation by its own internal struggles, prepared 
the implements necessary to the task allotted to him. 

"These things must have an end, O'Berne", the tax- 
gatherer resumed, as he loosened his neck cloth and laid 
it on the back of the chair. " I cannot continue long to 
lead this life — 'tis bad — 'tis wicked — 'tis unchristian. My 
good lady is for ever lecturing me about it, and I believe 
she's right. I promised her this morning that this should 
be the last time I would ever dine from home again, and 
I am resolved to keep my word, I am resolved to " 

Here he began to grow drowsy as he sat, and con- 
tinued nodding in his chair, while he spoke in interrupted 
sentences : 

"Yes — she's right — the women are right after all 
about these matters— they are more doc — do — docile — 
well — I'll mend. She hinted that I might begin too 
late — but no — to-morrow morning will be time enough — 
to-night it would be late indeed — Cas — Ca — Castle To — 
Tob--Tobin— farewell— I'll mend— 1*11 — re— form— I'll 
— I'll— To-morrow I'll begin— I'll " 

He dropped his head upon his breast and fell fast 
asleep. The storm had now subsided, and the moon by 
fits, as on the preceding night, gleamed brightly on the 



THE BARBER OF BANTRY. 265 

hearth. The barber opened the door, which looked into 
the orchard. The picture was one which might have 
made a spectator tremble, if there had been a spectator 
there. 0' Berne, with his worn and haggard countenance, 
standing at the open door, and looking with wild eyes and 
ghastly teeth into the moonlit orchard. The tax-gatherer 
Bleeping, with his neck-cloth laid aside, and his head 
hanging back in the profound repose of drunkenness — 
the hour late — the night favourable — and the instruments, 
which might as readily be made to serve the purposes of 
destruction as of utility, lyiug open on the barber's table. 
Let us close the scene upon this horrible tableau. 



CHAPTER X. 

In less than two hours after she bad first retired to rest, 
the sleep of Mrs. O'Berne, which had been disturbed by 
frightful dreams, was altogether broken by the sound of 
a foot-step in her room. Looking np, she beheld her hus- 
band, with an end of candle lighted in his hand, looking 
pale and terrified. In answer to her question, he said, 
that the tax-gatherer had not yet retired to rest. She 
fell asleep again and did not wake till morning. Her hus- 
band then informed her, that Mr. Moynehau, notwith- 
standing all his persuasions, had insisted on leaving the 
house on the preceding night, and taking the road tb his 
own residence, which was well known to be infested by 
footpads. But he had good news also for her ear. 
Before leaving the house, he had lent him a sura which 
would be more than sufficient to reestablish them 
in all their former comfort. But this was to be kept a 
secret. 

There was something in the manner or her husband, as 
he gave her this account, which perplexed and pained her. 
12 



266 THE BARBER OF BANTRT. 

It was not gloomy, as before, bnt unequally and fitfully 
joyous. He laughed, and his laughter was broken by a 
spasmodic action of the frame, as if a searing iron had 
suddenly been applied to a part of it. Mrs. O'Berne now 
feared, from many things her husband said, that the un- 
expected generosity of the tax-gatherer might produce an 
effect as dangerous to her husband's mind as his previous 
poverty. 

In the evening, while Mary sat musing on what had 
passed, her husband, who had gone out on business, 
suddenly entered the house with a hurried and agitated 
look. 

" I was right", said he, " in warning Mr. Moynehau not 
to take that road last night". 

" Why so ?" 

** His horse was found this morning near the village, 
but without a rider". 

Mrs. O'Berne clasped her hands with a silent gesture 
of affright. 

" I tell you truth — and there was blood upon the 
saddle-cloth — blood, Mary". 

" He was murdered then ?" 

*' Why so ? Who told you that ? How do you know it?" 

"What else does it look like? What else do they 
think of it?" 

"Think! Oh, they think as you do — but it is all 
conjecture". 

" Let him have perished as he may", said Mary, hurried 
onward by the dreadful tidings iuto an energy unusual to 
her disposition, " it is certain at least that he has per- 
ished. fearful Providence ! It was a heart of stone 
that took him in his fit of sin!" 

" Be charitable, wife", said the barber angrily. 

" I should be so, indeed. I thank you for the counsel. 
If he was murdered, then, may Heaven forgive his 
murderer!" 



THE BAKBEB Of BACTBY. 267 

" Pray for him", said the barber, " but not that way. 

Perhaps the wretch was crazed with want or hunger — 
perhaps he was strongly tempted — and that when ruin 
was threatening him on one side and the temptation assailed 
him on the other -and the opportunity — and the silence — 
and the night— perhaps he could not hold his hand — but 
what of that ?— Our children shall not starve, at all 
events — I have the gold — the gold". 
And he laughed with a shocking levity. 
" Yes, we have reason to rejoice", replied his wife, wii 
calmness — "but the widow — the poor widow ! To-nigh i. 
while the wind is howling about her house, how lonesome 
is her heart, and low within her! They had one child, a 
boy ; and she is often looking at him how, and asking 
herself if the story can be true. Oh, wretched man ! 
Had he, who did the deed, no wife, no family, to care for. 
when he made a widow and an orphan at a blow ? And 
all for a little dross !" 

" Well — well ", said the barber hurriedly, " perhaps he 
means to pay it back again as soon as he can, and to lay 
the bones in consecrated ground. What more can the poor 
wretch do now ? Oh, wife, they say such money is 
easily earned, but he who did it knows better". 

"To-night", continued Mary, following np her own 
train of thought, " while the servants are whispering in 
the kitchen, she is lying on her bed, with the child close 
by her, and listening to every fresh account they bring her 
of her loss. To see a husband or a wife go calmly to 
their doom — to tend them in their last sickness— to read 
them holy lessons — to pray for them aloud when they are 
dying or when they are dead — that's happiness to what 
she feels to-night, although when yon were sick I thought 
it would be misery. She must not even know tnat he lies 
in holy ground". 

" But perhaps he shall in time. Let us talk no more of 
this, to-night, at least". 



f68 THE BARBEB OF BANTRT. 

" Aye, Godfrey, it is t est ; blood will speak, if it 
should burst the grave for it". 

There was a cobbler in B , who, like our bar- 
ber, could scarcely obtaiu as many half-pence by his awl 
a? might procure him a sufficiency of the cheapest food. 
Yet, however he was enabled to procure the means, the 
fellow was a habitual drunkard. It was his practice when 
intoxicated, to take his post at the village cross, and, 
putting his hands under his leather apron, to commeuce a 
string of vociferous abuse against all the inhabitants of 
the place without exception. The out-pouring usually 
continued five or six hours without intermission, from ex- 
ordium to peroration, greatly to the scandal of the regular 
inhabitants, and to the entertainment of the little urchins 
of the place, who gathered round him in a circle in order 
to chorus his monologue with their shrill hurras. Yet, at 
other times, the unfortunate wretch could be as decent and 
well conducted as any individual in the place, and he 
might have been, as the world goes, an estimable cha- 
racter, if the fascination of strong drink had not an in- 
fluence over him which it appeared almost impossible for 
him to resist. 

Within a fortnight after the occurrence just related, it 
happened that this cobbler was sitting at work in his 
miserable hut, and singing, as he made his lapstone ring, 
when he was surprised to see the barber cross his thres- 
hold. The latter having closed the door behind him, and 
shoved in the bolt, approached the man of patches with 
a serious countenance. 

" Shnnahan", said he, " I have something serious to say 
to you, and it may be for your advantage, provided you 
promise to keep it secret". 

"Sacret, Mr. O'Berne? As to keepin' a sacret, 
providin' its nothin' agin law or conscience, I'll keep a 
sacret with any man brathin', though 'tis I says it, that 
oughtn't". 



THE BARBER OF BANTRY. 269 

** It is not against law n conscience. Listen then, 
for three nights successively, within the last fortnight, I 
dreamed of money in a certain place, that I will name to 
you, provided you promise to assist me in obtaining it". 

" Assist you ! I'll engage I will so, an' welcome. An' 
is this what you call something sarious to say to me ? 
Now I call it something pleasant — an' joyful — an' de- 
lightful !" exclaimed the cobbler, springing from his seat 
as he completed the climax. " Come away, an' let us lay 
hands on it at once". 

"No — no — " said the barber, "not so fast. The 
search must be made at night. I will call on you myself 
about eleven o'clock, and be ready to come with me. I 
have not even mentioned it to my wife, for fear she might 
have some scruples about using the money. The spot is 
not far distant, though lonesome enough. I will tell you 
where it is when I come at night". 

O'Berne was true to his appointment; and on this night 
it was, that in the presence of the cobbler, he dug up in a 
lonesome ruin, within less than a quarter of a mile of the 
village, that treasure, for the possession of which he ac- 
counted to his wife in a very different manner. A 
moderate portion of the prize easily bribed the cobbler to 
keep silence until it should suit O'Berne's convenience to 
call on him to give testimony of the manner in which he 
had obtained the money. 

Soon after, the barber and his family left the neigh- 
bourhood of B , where they were not heard 

again of for more than a score of years. 



CHAPTER XI. 

Young Edmtmd Moynehan was brought np with all the 
care that could possibly be bestowed on the education of a 
child. He was carefully preserved, in his early years, 



270 THE BAUBEB OF BANTBT. 

from all access of superstition. He heard none of those 
garrulous tales which too often haunt the nursery, and be- 
speak future victims to weakness of mind, almost in tha 
very cradle. In the mean time, the true spirit of religion 
was deeply impressed upon his heart; and his practice 
was the more fervent in proportion as it was more en- 
lightened. He grew apace, and in time inherited the office 
which had proved so fatal to his father. He exercised it, 
however, in a very different manner. He took no bribes, 
and he allowed no false returns. The astonishment which 

such a line of conduct excited about B was 

proportioned to the novelty of the provocation. Almost 
every tax-payer joined in abuse of Edmund Moynehau. 
Many called him a mean, exact, prying fellow ; and a few 
of the more fiery gentry even talked of "calling him out"; 
but he did not alter his course, and they found themselves 
under the necessity of being as exact as himself. In all 
other respects, he was what his father had been in his 
earlier and happier days. 

He had reached his three -and-twentieth year without 
meeting any adventure out of the ordinary course of rural 
life in the rank in which he moved. He yet retained a 
strong recollection of his parent, and he felt, without the 
least emotion of revenge, a strong desire to investigate the 
mystery of his disappearance. 

One evening, he was standing at the window of the 
small parlour which looked out (for he now occupied the 
dwelling first owned by his father) on the waters of the 
Shannon. Although the sun shone bright, a westerly gale 
drove fiercely along the surface of the stream, and con- 
fined the fishing craft to their moorings by the windward 
beach. The narrow-pinioned fishers hovering above the 
broken waves, by their screams and rapid motion added 
much to the interest of the scene. Occasionally a bulky 
cormorant flew with outstretched neck along the surface of 
the bay, while the pleasure boat (which Moynehan some- 



THE BAKBKR OF BANTBY. 271 

times used in his days of leisure), tossed and tneged at 
her anchor by the shore. 

Living, notwithstanding his occupation, in comparative 
solitude, with few objects to inteiest his thoughts in an)' 
remarkable degree, it is not surprising that young Moy- 
nehan often dwelt with undiminished interest upon the 
mystery of his father's fate. That violence, and human 
violence, had been employed in his destruction, he en- 
tertained no doubt. Of greater enterprise and firmness 
than his father had been, he only wanted footing for the 
inquiry, and the total absence of this was what often lay 
heavy at his heart. 

A portrait of his father, rudely finished, yet with 
sufficient resemblance to correspond with his recollection 
of the original, was suspended against the wall. Op- 
pressed with the reflections which crowded on his mind 
as he gazed on the familiar features, he left the house and 
hurried to the strand, where he paced for some time in 
silence along the margin of the water. His boatman was 
employed in repairing the keel of a small skiff", which was 
used as a kind of tender on the pleasure boat. Near him, 
Rick Lillis, grown gray with years, and somewhat bowed 
by care, was leaning against a huge block of stone, and 
observing the boatman at work. 

**The young masther looks as if he was put out a 
-little", 6aid the boatman. 

" Ah, little admiration he should", replied the old herds- 
man. " It is fourteen years and better now since we lost 
the ould one. Many's the time since I repented that I 
didn't go with him that night, or make him go with me. 
But when a man's hour's come they say the world wouldn't 
put it off. I might well kuow them hills were no place 
for any one to be thravelling at night, let alone such a 
night as that ; but he wouldn't, be said by me. I hard of 
a thing happening among them hills before, that was 



272 THE BARBER OF BANTRY. 

enough to make anybody look about him before he'd 
venture among 'em late at uight". 

" What was that ?" 

" I'll tell you. You know Jerry Lacey, the pedlar, that 
used to go through the counthry formerly sellin' ribbons, 
an' rings, an' snuff-boxes, an' things that way, at the great 
bouses an' places along the road T" 

"You mean him that has a shop now overright where 
O'Berne the barber lived formerly at B ?" 

" I do — the very man. He was thravellin' from Cork, 
an' he took the conthrary way through the same mountains 
that my master (rest his sowl!) an' myself went that night. 
Well, if he did, it come late upon him, an' he turned off 
the road, thinkin' to make a short cut, an' he lost his way 
Ki the mountains, an' it was midnight before he met a 
human christian, or one ha'p'orth. 'What'll become o* 
me at all, I wondher', says Jerry ; * 'twas the misforthinate 
hour I ever turned off o' you, for one road', says he. Well, 
on he went, an' in place o' comin' to any place, 'tis 
Ionesomer an' lonesomer the road was gettin' upon him, till 
at last he hard a nize, as it were o' somebody hammerin' 
at a little distance. So he med towards the nize. Well, 
'tisn't long till he comes to a little lonesome cabin without 
e'er a windy in front, and a rish light burnin' within, an' 
the doore half open, an' the ugliest man ever you see 
sit tin' upon a stool iu the middle of the floore, and he 
bavin' a tinker's anvil on his lap, an' he makin' saucepans. 

'• ' Bless all here', says Jerry, pushing in the door. 

"The little man made him no answer, only looked up 
sthraight in his face, an' tould him to come in an' shet the 
doore. 

•• • An' what do you want now ?' says the little tinker, 
when Jerry done what he bid him. 

" ' Shelther, then, for the night, plase your lordship, 
tays Jerry, thinkin' it betther to be civil. 



BAKBER OF BANTBY. 273 

•* * Take a sate by the tire', says the tinker, * an* well 
tee what's to be done'. 

" ' That your reverence may lose nothin' by it', says 
Jerry, dhrawin' a chair. ' Them that give the stranger 
shelter in this world, won't be left without it themselves 
in the next'. 

" Well, there they sat. There was a pot boiling over 
the fire, an' it had a smell o' mait, which, I'll be bail, Jerry 
wasn't sorry to find. So afther a while, the tinker went 
out, as he said, to dig a handful o' pzaties, to have with 
the mait, an' tould Jerry for his life not to touch one 
ha'p'orth about the place, an' above all things, not to look 
into the pot, for if he'd daar do it, the mutton 'ud be 
spiled. Well, hardly was he outside the doore, when Jerry 
was a'most ready to faint, wantin' to know what was in 
the pot. So as there was ne'er a windee, aud the doore 
fast shet, he thought he'd take one dawny peep. ' Never 
welcome himself an' his pot', says Jerry, 'if he hadn't to 
say an) thing about it, sure I wouldn't care one bane what 
was in it. Tin kilt from it, for a pot', says he, fixin' his 
two eyes upon it. 'I won't look at it at all', says he, ''tis 
up at the dhresser I'll look, an' I'll whistle the Humours o' 
Glin, an' who knows but I'd shkame away the thoughts of 
it 'till himself 'ud come in'. So he turned his back to the 
fire, and began whistling. "Tis bilin' greatly, what- 
somever it is', says he by an' by. ' Ah sure what hurt is 
there in one peep ? How will he ever find it out ? A 
likely story indeed, that the mutton 'ud be spiled by one 
look. He's an ould rogue, that's what he is, an' I'll have 
a peep in spite o' the Danes'. So he went to the fire- 
side, and he ruz the lid. There was a great steam, an' 
the w ather biliu' tantivity. ' I'm in dhread o' my life', 
says Jerry. " What'U I do at all, if he pins me 
in the fact? No matther, here goes, any way', an' 
he struck down a Hethfork into the wather. Well, 
I'll go bail he opened his eyes wide enough, when 
12* 



274 TSS BARBER OF BANTRT. 

he drew tip upon the points of the fork a collop of • 
mail's hand " 

" Eyeh, Rick, howl !" 

" I'm only tellin' yoa the story as I hard it myself. 
Sure I wasn't by". 

"Do you mane to persuade me a thing o' that kiud 
ever happened ?" 

" Can't you hear my story ? what do I know only as I 
hear ? ' Well', s&ys Jerry, an' he lookin' at his prize, 
'here's a state', says he, 'here's purty work; what in the 
world will become o' me now at all ?' says he : ' I'll let 
down the pot-lid any way'. 

"Well hardly all was right, when the tinker come in. 

" ' Did you look in the pot ? says be. 

" ' Oh my lord', says Jerry, *• what for 'ud I be lookin' 
in it?' 

" ' Are you hungry i" 

" ' Not much, ray lord'. 

"'Will you take a cup o the broth?' 

" Well, Jerry thought he'd dhrop, when he hard him 
axin' him to take a cup o' the broth. 

" ' Not any, we're obleest to your reverence', says he, 
bowin' very polite. 

" ' What'll you do then ?' says the tinker. 

'" I'll stay as I am, with your lordship's good will'. 

''■'There's a bed within in the room, there; may be 
you liko to take a stretch on it ?' 

" Why then I believe I will, plase your reverence', 
says Jerry / as I'm tired'. 

" So he took his pack, an' away with him into the room, 
as if he was walkin' into the mouth of a tiger. He didn't 
like to go to bed, although there was the nicest bedstead 
in a corner, with white dimity curtains, an' a fine soft 
tick, an' the room nately boorded an' soundid as if there 
was a kitchen under it. So he rowled himself in his 
great coat, an' sat down in a corner waitin' to see what 



THE BARBER OF BANTBT. 275 

'ud happen, bein' in dhread he'd fall asleep, if he stretched 
upon the bed. The moon was shinin' in the windee, when, 
abont twelve o'clock, as sure as you're standin' there, he 
tould my father, he seen the bed sinkin' in the ground. 
Oh, his heart was below in his shoe ! ' Wasn't it the good 
thought o' me', says he, ' not to go to bed ? I declare to 
my heart', says he, ' I'll make a race while he's below !' 
So out he started, an I'll engage 'tis long till he was caught 
goin' through the mountains at night again". 

" Dear knows, that's a woudherful story", said the 
boatman. " But asy ! what boat is that I wondher, 
runnin' in for the little creek? Some jot or another, 
may be dhruv in by the wind, an' she comin' in from 
Cove". 

On nearer approach, however, the vessel seemed too 
small to answer this conjecture. She was a little cutter, 
of about ten or twelve tons burden, with snow white 
sails, close-reefed, and drenched to the peak with spray. 
Casting anchor near the shore, a small boat was lowered 
from the stem, into which two persons entered, and pro- 
ceeded to land. On reaching the shore, one left the boat, 
while the other, pushing off into the breakers, which even 
here ran high, returned to the cutter. The stranger, who 
remained, was a man deeply " declined into the vale of 
years", wrapped in an old plaid cloak, and wearing a cap 
of seal-skin. He stooped much, and walked with so 
much difficulty, that but for a stick, on which he leaned, 
it would have beeu impossible for him to have maintained 
his upright position. Perceiving him about to take the 
road leading to the interior, young Moynehan approached, 
and politely asked him to his house for the night, as it was 
usual to do with any stranger who travelled in these lonely 
districts. The only inn, he informed him, at which he 
could obtain accommodation, was at such a distance that it 
would fatigue him extremely to reach it on foot that day. 
The same accommodation he offered for his boatman. 



276 THE BARBEB OF BANTBT. 

There was in the stranger's manner of accepting the 
courtesy, an air of deep humility and deprecation, that 
indicated habitual suffering. He trembled like one in a 
fit of palsy, and bowed low, supporting himself by grasping 
his stick with both hands, while he murmured forth his 
thanks. The same deep gratitude he showed for every 
trivial attention that was paid him on his entering the 
house. It seemed as if he thought the humblest attitude 
he could assume was far above his pretensions, and no 
exertions that either the widow or her son could make, 
were sufficient to draw him into free and unembarrassed 
conversation throughout the evening. He sat as far apart 
as possible from every individual that was present, bowed 
with the utmost respect at every word that was addressed 
to him. as if it were a favour of the last importance. Two 
or three times, Edmund Moynehan saw, or fancied he saw, 
the eyes of the stranger rest upon his features with an 
expression of inquiry, which, however, instantly disappeared 
as soon as their glances met. After Mrs. Moynehan had 
retired for the night, he endeavoured to lead their guest 
into more familiar dialogue, and to invite him to confi- 
dence by showing him an example. 

" You must excuse my mother's retiring so early ", 
said Edmund; "she always does so, since my father's death. 
We are rather a lonely family at present". 

" Indeed, sir ?" said the stranger with a smile. 

" You are probably new to this country ?" asked 
Edmund. 

" Indeed, sir, much the same. It is now so long since 
I left it, that I may well be called a stranger". 

"Ah, then it is not likely that you are acquainted with 
our misfortune. I never like, of course, to allude to it in 
the presence of my mother, but now that she is gone, it 
may furnish you with some kind of apology for the sorrv 
entertainment you have met to-night". 

The stranger bowed low, but made no reply, and Edmund 



THX BARBER OF BAKTRT. 277 

(who loved to talk of his father's unacconn table dis- 
appearance) gave him a full detail of all the circumstances 
respecting it which had come to his knowledge. The 
stranger seemed to listen with the deepest interest, but 
like one who was habituated to feelings of a still deeper 
kind thau any which the narrative was calculated to excite 
in the mind of an uninterested person. 

"There are few circumstances attending my father's 
death", said Edmund, " supposing him to have perished, 
and indeed it would be idle to think otherwise, which are 
to my mind so painful as its suddenness. Even at this 
distance of time, and with my slight remembrance of my 
father, it is surprising to myself what slight circumstances 
will bring his fate, in all its force, upon my mind. The 
other day, I happened to be present in the cottage of a 
tenant, who lay in his death-sickness, endeavouring with 
all the power of his heart and mind to review and an- 
ticipate the comiug judgment on the whole. When I saw 
him piously receiving the rites of his religion, and dying 
at last amid the audible prayers of his family, how keenly 
did the thought of my father's murder penetrate my soul, 
wiieu I compare it with this peaceful parting!" 

Edmund paused, but the stranger made no remark. 

" Still", continued Edmund, " I would not exchange his 
lot with that of his murderer". 

" No, no — oh, no", replied the stranger. 

"To be sure", said Edmund, " I can but guess what the 
remorse attending such a crime should be, but even from 
conjecture, I wonder how a human being could prefer the 
custody of such a torturing secret, even to detection and 
ignominy ". 

** Hanging", said the stranger, " is such ft horrid 
death". 

" But can it, short as the anguish is, be anything so 
horrible as the remorse for snch a deed ?"' 

•* Oil, no, I said not that", replied the stranger, " for 

16 



278 THE BARBER OF BANTRT. 

sure I am — at least I think — that were the innocent trnty 
to know what it is to feel remorse, they would never steep 
their hands in crime. But they know nothing of it — 
books — legends — all are painted flame to the fire of 
genuine remorse in a bosom that is capable of feeling it". 

" If such be your opinion", said Edmund, " how do you 
account for the apparent indifference in which many live 
who are known to have perpetrated the most appalling 
crimes ?" 

"I know not", said the stranger; "that snch is the 
fact appears indisputable, but I cannot account for it on 
natural reasons. Yet dreadful as it is to feel remorse, so 
far at least as one may guess, to Jo nothing but tremble 
for the future, and nothing but shudder at the past ; to lie 
on a restless bed, and find no comfort in the daylight, nor 
in the sight of friends' faces or the hearing of familiar 
conversation ; I should still prefer remorse in its most 
poignant form, to the dreadful insensibility that you 
describe". 

"Yon, then", said Edmund, "would not be one of 
those who prefer remorse to reparation ?" 

"How can I answer you?" replied the stranger, 
"Death, certain death is a thing so terrible to con- 
template with a steady eye". 

" It would appear indeed", said Edmund, " as if there 
were persons who could find it easier to inflict than to 
endure it". 

At this moment the stranger, who scarcely seemed to 
be in health during the whole conversation, complained of 
fatigue, and expressed a wish to go to rest. Edmunu 
ordered a light, and the servant went before to prepare 
the room. 

! 'There'3 no sin, I hope, sir", said the old man, turning 
round with difficulty as he slowly walked towards the 
chamber door. " There's no sin after all, I hope, that 
may not meet forgiveness. Even you, sir, I am sure. 



THE BARBEB OF BANTRT. 279 

could forgive the man who has injured yon so nearly, pro- 
vided he were humbly to beg forgiveness at yonr feet ? 
How much more reasonably might he hope for mercy ai 
its very source ?" 

" The difference is essential", answered Edmund. " l 
am far from feeling personal resentment against the authoi 
of my father's death. I do not mean to boast that I am 
free from even the first impulses of passions that are 
common to our nature ; but as there are pangs that pierce 
too deep for tears — as there is bliss too exquisite for 
laughter — so also there are injuries that in their very 
magnitude exclude all thought of self-redress — that 
in a peculiar manner seem to make vengeance (as 
sure it is in every case) an usurpation of the divine 
prerogative". 

The stranger retired, and Edmund soon after followed 
his example. He had not yet, however, closed his eyes, 
when the door opened, and a head was protruded into the 
apartment. It was that of old Rick Lillis. 

" Whist! Misther Edmund!" 

"Well, Rick?" 

'< Are you asleep, sir ?" 

" How could I answer your call if I were ?" 

" Sure enough, sir", said Rick, coming in and closing 
the door behind him. " Do you know that sthrauge 
jettleman, sir ?" 

" Not I. Do you know anything of him ?" 

" Oh, no, sir, only I just stepped in to mention a 
dhroll thing I seen him doing that surprised me". 

" Doing ? When ? Is he not in his room ?" 

" He was, sir, an' I seen the candle shinin' there when 
I was walkin' down the lawn to go home for rhe nigh>, 
but of a sudden it moved, au' out it come to the parlour. 
4 1 declare to my heart', says I, \ I'll go back an' see 
what that lad wants out in the parlour again'. So I crep 
up to the windee, an' I jest tnk off my hat this way an' 



280 THE BARBER OF BANTRT. 

peeped in, and sure there I seen him plain enough. An 
what do you think he was doin', sir ?" 

" How can I tell ?" 

" Sure enough. Well, he had the candle ruz up in his 
hand, an' he viewin' the pecthur — your poor father's 
pecthur this was — again the wall, an' if he did, afther 
viewin' it all over, he med towards the table, an' down he 
sat, an' covered his face this way with his two hands for 
as good as a quarter of an hour; an' when he done 
thinkin', or whatsomever he was doin', he ruz up again 
an' tuk out a little pocket-book, an' wrote something ; but, 
just at that moment, it so happened that I hot the pane 
o' glass with the lafe o' my hat unknownst, an' he started 
like a little robineen, which I did also, an' run for the bare 
life, round by the haggart an' in the kitchen doore, in 
dhread o' my life he'd ketch me. An' that's my story." 

" It's curious," said Moynehan. " Were you able to 
learn from his boatman who they were ?" 

" Not a word, sir. Many an offer I med, but it's no 
use for me." 

On the following morning to the astonishment of all 
the family, the stranger was nowhere to be found. The 
bed appeared as if it had been slept in, but there was no 
other trace remaining of their visitor. All inquiry was 
vain ; and they ceased at length to speak of what had 
taken place. 



CHAPTER XII. 



What was more singular, the manner of the stranger's 
disappearance was as much a secret to himself as to any- 
body else. He had gone tc rest on the preceding night in 
the bed which was assigned to him, nor did he wako 'till 



THE BARBER OF BANTRT. 281 

after sunrise on the following morning. What then was 
his astonishment and terror to find himself fully dressed, 
wrapped in his cloak, and lying in a meadow on the road- 
side, within more than a mile from the river, and in sight 

of the village of B ! Ashamed, however, to 

return to his hostess and her son after so singular an ad- 
venture, and not knowing how he could obtain credit for 
the truth, he pursued his way without interruption. 

It happened in a few months after, that Edmund Moy- 
nehan, returning late from a journey, called into Rath 
Danaher, where he was acquainted. In the course of the 
evening, the conversation turned upon a report then pre- 
valent about B , respecting a " haunted house" 

in the outskirts of the place, which had once, they said, 
been tenanted by a barber of the name of O'Berae, but in 
consequence of having got an ill name, had for a long 
time continued uninhabited. The barber and his wife, 
they understood, had died abroad, but more than once of 
late strange noises had been heard about the place at 
night, and one person in particular distinctly averred that 
he had seen the ghost of the barber himself, with a light 
in his hand, going through all his professional evolutions 
as if attending and entertaining customers. One or two, 
they said, on the strength of this report, had had the 
courage to sit up alone at night to question the phantom, 
but in vain, for they had neither seen nor heard anything 
supernatural. 

So highly was Edmund's curiosity excited by this 
account, that he immediately formed the resolution to 
^eatch with Lillis for the appearance of the phantom. 
The moment he announced this determination, he became, 
as may be supposed, the hero of the company. All 
crowded about him describing the fearful nature of the 
sounds which had been heard, and advising him to give up 
the idea as rash and foolish. At one time, they said, 
steps as of hoofs iron-shod were heard resounding through 



r^ 



2 OZ THE BARBER OF BANTBT. 

the house ; at another, whispers and sighs were audibly 
breathed in the very face of the listener ; while at other 
times, a heavy pace was heard descending the stairs, and 
at every landing-place a leap that shook the walls to their 
foundation aud made every door upon that story fly open 
open as if burst by lightning. 

It may be easily supposed that, of the two, Rick Lillis 
was not the more desirous to put this audacious ex- 
periment in execution. He was encouraged, however, on 
understanding that the boatman was to be of the party. 
On the following evening, the three set out together to the 
barber's house. The night was falling fast, but a bright 
crescent supplied the place of the declining day-light. 
The barber's house had all the appearance of a long- 
deserted tenement. The windows were broken, the 
shutters shut, the little flower-plots overgrown with weeds, 
aud the wood-work of the building crushed and worm- 
eateu. On entering the house, Rick and the boatman 
proceeded to make two large fires, one for themselves in 
an inner room, the other for Edmund Moynehan in that 
which had heretofore served the purpose of a kitchen. 
In each there was a table laid with lights and materials 
for supper. In what had been the kitchen, young Moy- 
nehan remained alone, having given directions to his two 
attendants, whatever they might see or hear, not to 
intrude on him uncalled. As this was the chamber which 
had especially the fame of being " haunted", Rick felt no 
inclination whatever to dispute his commands, and would 
even have been better pleased that the prohibition had 
been wholly unconditional. 

Night bad long fallen, and the two fellow-servants, en- 
couraged by the absence of any thing which could give 
countenance to the awful rumours they had heard, began 
to converse with freedom, while thsy laid hands on the 
cheer which had been laid before them. Rick, in the 
meantime, exerted all his eloquence and all his ghostly 



THE BARBER OF BANTRT. 283 

lore in labouring to shake the obstinate incredulity of 
big companion, who could and would admit no possibility 
of the truth of such a rumour. 

" Tell me", he said, at last, in indignation, "if you were 
to see it yourself, would you believe it ?" 

" I would". 

" Tis a wondher. An' you won't believe other people 
when they sees it. Don't they say many a time, that if 
a man buries money, or if he didn't pay his debts before 
he died, or wronged any body, he'll be troubled that way, 
an' risin' ever an' always till " 

He paused, for at this moment a noise was heard at the 
door of the room in which they sat. It opened, and a 
sight appeared which froze the very heart of Rick, and 
even appalled for a time the incredulous mind of the 
boatman. A figure wearing a barber's apron, and bearing 
in its hands a basin and other professional implements, 
was seen distinctly to advance into the lighted room, and 
slowly moved towards where the watchers sat. Rick 
muttered a fervent ejaculation. 

" I'll spake to it", said the boatman. 

** A' Tim, eroo ! Tim a-voumeen !" 

u Do you mind his eyes ?" said Tim. 

" Blazin' like two coals o' fire", said Rick. " A' Tim, 
what'll become of us! — Oh, wisha, wisha!' 

" I'll spake to it", said Tim. 

" A' Tim, don't asthore ! The less you say to it the 
betther, 'till the third time of it comin', an' if I wait for 
the third time, I'll give you leave to say my name isn't 
Rick Lillis". 

The figure passed slowly by, and into the room in 
which young Moynehan sat. While this event proceeded, 
the latter was occupied with thoughts of an absorbing 
kind. The loneliness of the place and the purpose for 
which he had come thither, threw him naturally into a 
mood of melancholy reflection, and his thoughts gradually 



284 THE BABBEB OF EANTRT. 

fixed themselves upon his father's story, which always 
occupied the. deepest place in his mind. He regretted ex- 
tremely that he had not taken greater pains to search aftei 
their strange gnest, whose conduct respecting the portrait, 
together with his unceremonious departure, had indicated 
something more than an accidental interest. While he 
pursued these thoughts, the door of the inner room was 
opened, and it required all his presence of mind to enable 
him to maintain his resolution. The barber's ghost was 
there indeed before his eyes ! Oue glance, however, at 
the old man's countenance was sufficient to reassure him, 
while at the same time it touched as if with an electric 
tangent the deepest feelings of his nature. The figure, 
differing only in attire, was that of the old man to 
whom they had given a night's lodging a short time 
before ! 

Edmund paased : he held his very breath with caution, 
while the figure, with dreamy eyes and measured 
thoughtful action, set about the task which he seemed to 
have in hand. His motion, however, although soft, was 
not so noiseless as to intimate the presence of a spiritual 
being. He laid aside the basin, took out a razor which 
appeared covered with rust, and seemed to whet it for 
some moments. He then paused for a long time, and 
seemed to suffer under the infliction of some excruciating 
doubt. 

"Thou shalt not steal!" — he said in a whisper, "that's 
true. But must our children perish ?" 

He paused, and Edmund bent his whole mind to listen. 

"Mary!" continued the barber, "lay by that prayer 
book, and attend to me. Mary, I say ! True — true ! 
she is asleep— they are all asleep but he and I. Who'll 
find it out? None— none — there is no fear". 

Here he set a chair, and seemed as if watching the 
movements of another person. 

44 Honesty ?" said he, still speaking in broken whispers, 



THE BARBER OF BAHTRT. 385 

"what's that? Is it justice? That my babes should 
starve while he — besides — 'tis public — the public money — 
a mere grain — a drop — Oh ! all the gold ! what a heap ! 
what a heap of gold ! Here's riches ! Where's the evil! 
'Tis nothing to the state, and we shall never want again". 

It then suddenly appeared as if his thoughts had taken 
a wholly new direction, for he put on a hurried manner, 
and exclaimed with great rapidity, but yet in whispered 
accents — 

" What's to be done ? — He wakes ! He will search 
the house, and all will be discovered. I know it — the 
pear- tree in ihe orchard — Is it locked again, and the 
stones as heavy as the gold ? — Thief? — hark ! Who calls 
me thief?" 

Here he shrunk upon himself with so much terror as to 
contract his figure to nearly half its usual height. " Oh, 
yes — all that is past ! I can no longer look them in the 
face". Again his manner changed, and sinking on his 
knees, he fixed his eyes upon the ground, as if arrested 
by some object of riveting interest. " Who has done 
this ?" he said in a whisper. " Quite stiff and cold ! and 
the portmanteau gone ! Oh, misery ! what a night ! how 
ill begun, and ended immeasurably worse — let him lie 
there awhile— we'll find a time to bury it. But the gold! 
yes ! yes ! — the gold ! the gold ! the gold ! We are safe 
at last — our children shall not starve". 

Here be held up his hands as if in exultation, and 
burst into a loud and lengthened fit of laughter, while he 
hogged his arms close, as if they held a treasure, and his 
countenance was convulsed between delight and biting 
agony. After a little time, he started as if some new 
thought had struck him. 

"The razor — " he said, "the razor — where did I 
leave it?" 

Edmnnd, however, had secured what he now considered 
the dumb but fatal witness of its owner's guilt. Tfat 



286 THE BARBER OF BANTRT. 

distress of the sleeper seemed extreme at not finding it, 
but again his thoughts appeared to run into a new 
direction, and after muttering something more about the 
orchard and the pear-tree, he advanced to the kitchen 
door and opened it. Edmund quickiy followed, but the 
door was fast before he reached it, nor could all his 
strength or dexterity avail to open it. Conceiving the 
quantity of evidence hardly sufficient to take any decided 
step upon the instant, he waited until morning, when he 
hastened to lay the whole before a neighbouring ma- 
gistrate. It was determined, in order, by the number of 
witnesses, to add as much as possible to the evidence 
already procured, to watch for another night in the de- 
serted house, in the expectation of a second ghostly visit 
from its former owner. The police supplied by the ma- 
gistrate were stationed in the garden, while Edmund, now 
without light or fire, awaited, in a secret corner of the 
kitchen, the appearance of him whom he strongly sus- 
pected to be his father's murderer. He was not dis- 
appointed. About midnight the barber came, but not, as 
on the preceding night, a walking sleeper. He entered 
wide awake — wrapt in his cloak, and followed by a man 
whom Edmund easily recognized as the boatman who had 
spent the night with hiin at their house. 

" You shall be well rewarded", said the barber, " but 
be secret. I will show you where the body lies that I 
told you of — but remember there are the deepest reasons 
for keeping secret the whole story of my friend's death, 
and though I wish to have him laid in holy ground, it 
tfould be evil and not good to have it talked of". 

" Never fear", said the boatman, " only show the spot". 

The barber accordingly led the way to the garden. 
Edmund followed to the pear-tree, at the root of which 
they dug up the soil, setting their spades in the direction 
indicated by the old man. In a short time he saw them 
raise from the earth the bone3 of a human figure, which 



THE BARBER OF BANTBV. §87 

they placed upon the ground. Closing in the grave, tiny 
took the cloth between them, and were in the act of 
retiring from the orchard, when Edmund advanced upon 
the path before them, and commanded them to halt. 

"Who's there?" exclaimed the barber. 

" The son of your victim", answered Edmund ; " of him 
whom you murdered with this razor, and whose bones you 
ire conveying hence. You are our prisoner". 

The barber had scarcely heard these words when he 
sunk, overpowered by terror, at the feet of his accuser. 
The assistant, affrighted at what was said, was about to 
fly, when he was intercepted by the magistrate's police, 
rt'ho brought the whole party before that functionary on 
tho following morning. The latter, having heard the 
whole of the circumstances, was about to issue a warrant 
of committal, when the barber, who had not said a word 
in his own defence during the whole of the proceedings, 
requested at length to be heard in explanation. His wish 
was instantly complied with, and the deepest silence and 
attention prevailed while he spoke as follows: — 

" It will surprise you, Mr. Magistrate, and you, Mr. 
Moynehan, to learn, that notwithstanding all this weight 
of circumstance, I am not guilty of the offence with which 
you charge me. When I have proved my innocence, as 
T shall do, ray case will furnish a strong instance of the 
fallibility of any evidence that is indirect in a case where 
human life is interested. All the circumstances are true — 
my extreme necessity — his midnight visit to my house — 
his disappearance on that night, accompanied by signs of 
violence — my subsequent increase of wealth — and the 
eeeming revelation of my waking dream, as overheard by 
Mr. Moynehan : and yet I am not guilty of this crime. 
If you will have patience to listen, I will tell you how far 
my guilt extended, and where it stopped". 

He then detailed the circumstances preceding the noc- 
turnal visit of the deceased tax- gatherer, disguising 



28S THE BARBER OF BANTUY. 

nothing of his poverty, nor the many temptations by nrhirt 
he was beset. 

"Still", said he, "I tell you a simple truth when I 
assert that, during the whole time of this visit, while he 
lay sleeping in his chair, aud while I held the razor in my 
hand, so shocking a thought as that of taking a fellow- 
creature's life never once, even for an instant, crossed my 
mind. But there was another temptation which did 
suggest itself, and to which I did give way. The port- 
manteau containing the money, lay on a chair near the 
window — he slept profoundly — I took the key from his 
pocket — I removed the money, which was chiefly in gold 
and silver, and filling the two bags in which it was con- 
tained with small pebbles of about an equal weight, I 
replaced the portmanteau as it was before. I then awoke 
him with difficulty, and fearful of being discovered if he 
remained till morning, persuaded him to resume his 
journey. 

" He had scarcely left the house when I found myself 
seized with an unaccountable terror at the idea of de- 
tection and ignominy. Accordingly, abstracting from the 
sum a few pieces of silver for present uses, I made fast 
the remainder in a bag, and hurried out into the air, un- 
certain whither to direct my steps. I ran across the 
neighbouring fields with the design of seeking out some 
place oi concealment for my treasure. An old ruin within 
a short distance of the village suggested itself as a 
favourable spot for my design, and thither accordingly I 
hastened. In an obscure corner of the building I de- 
posited the money, and returned to my own house with a 
mind distracted by anxiety and remorse. 

" On my way home, I heard voices, and the sound of 
horses' feet, in a field upon my right. I listened, and the 
words; 1 caught seemed to be those of people who were 
exercising awd leaping horses. Soon after, a horse without 
t rider left the field at full gallop. The sounds ceased, 



TIE BARBER OF BANTRT. 289 

and in a short time I saw two horsemen galloping from 
the place. Strange as it may seem, I have the proof of 
what I am about to state, and let it warn you, sir, and 
all who are in power, to weigh well the grounds on which 
they decide the guilt or innocence of th3 wretches whom 
they judge. I entered the field, and found there, lying at 
a distance from the ditch, the body of the tax-collector, 
newly dead, with a dreadful wound upon the head, and 
the portmanteau gone! My first impulse — I know not 
wherefore — was to conceal the work of murder. Favoured 
by the night, which still continued stormy, I conveyed 
the body to my own orchard, where I gave it temporary 
interment in the spot from which I was last night detected 
in the act of seeing it removed. It would be vain to tell 
what poignancy this dreadful addition to the terrors of the 
night imparted to my remorse. I felt almost as if I had 
been myself the author of his destruction; and the apparent 
certainty, likewise, that the detection of the crime which 
I had committed, would be sufficient to convict me also in 
the eyes of all judges of that which I had not, made my 
life one protracted thought of fear and misery". 

Here the barber related, with feelings of the deepest 
shame, the device which he had adopted of digging up the 
treasure in the presence of the cobbler, in order to throw 
a veil over the real origiu of his new prosperity. 

" Still", said he, " I could not be at rest amid the 
scenes which continually reminded me of that terrible 
event. The consciousness of meanness joined to guilt 
added the poignancy of self-contempt to the deeper an- 
guish of remorse. I fled the country, and sought refuge in 
change of scene from my fears and my remembrances. 

"But it was in vain. I could not fin 1 repose, for I 
carried my violated conscience still about me. Every 
new article I purchased for the use of my family — every 
fresh morsel of food that I lifted to my lips, seemed like a 
new and aggravated theft. I would at this time have 

13 



290 THE BARBER OF BANTRT. 

given the whole world for a friend to whom I could confide 
the secret that destroyed me. I thought of making a foil 
disclosure to my wife, but she was far too good and holy 
to be the depositary of snch a confidence. 

" I entered into trade, and was successful, and in my 
success, for a time, I lost something of my inward agony. 
r will not weary you, gentlemen, by a long detail of the 
means by which I became acquainted with many of the real 
perpetrators of the more heinous offence. They were two 
persons who dined in company with Mr. Moynehan at 
Castle Tobin, on the evening previous to his disappearance. 
One died in Ireland soon after the occurrence — the other, 
William Cnsack (commonly called Buffer), died abroad, 
and left this written confession of their common guilt, 
which I obtained as you shall hear. 

" The hand of Providence began to press upon my house. 
One member after another of my family dropped into the 
grave, until I remained alone in the wcrld with my remorse 
for a companion. Misfortune humbled me : I sought relief 
at length at the right source, and revealed the whole to a 
clergyman who attended me in a dangerous illness. It 
was through his means that document came into my 
possession — and it is in fulfilment of his injunction that I 
have now come to the restitution of the money which I 
have so long retained". 

Strange as the barber'8 defence appeared to Edmund 
and the magistrate, it was fully substantiated in the sequel 
by the testimony of the clergyman who had placed the 
confession, for his security, in the hands of O'Berne. The 
mode of his detection by Edmund Moynehan relieved the 
barber from an apprehension which had long sat next to 
his remorse upon his mind. This was the fancy that he 
had been haunted by an evil spirit, who disturbed him in 
his sleep, and had on one occasion engaged him in a fatal 
compact. It now appeared that himself, in his somnam- 
bulism, bad performed all those feats which had so much 



THE BARBER OF BANTRY. i£l 

perplexed him, and that his midnight excursion to the fir- 
grove was but a dream, to which he never would have paid 
attention, but for the corroboration afforded to it by the 
other mysterious occurrences. There was no prosecution 
instituted on the minor offence, and the barber continued 
long after to lead a penitential life in the neighbourhood. 
The house, however, has long been razed (as we have 
already mentioned) to the earth, and it is legend alone that 
preserves the memory of its situation amongst the neigh' 
bottling villagers. 



THE BROWN MAS. 



AH sorts of cattle he did eat : 

Some say he eat up trees, 
And that the forest sure he would 
Devour up by degrees. 
Fo» Louses and churches were to him geese and turkeys; 

He ate all, and left none behind, 
Bat mj;\ stones, dear Jack, which he could not crack. 
Which on the hills you'll find. 

Dragon of Wantlty 



The common Irish expression of "the seven devils" does 
Dot, it wouid appear, owe its origin to the supernatural 
influences ascribed to that numeral, from its frequent 
associations ^ith the greatest and most soiemn occasions 
of theological history. If one were disposed to be fan- 
cifully metaphysical upon the subject, it might not be 
amiss to compare credulity to a sort of mental prism, by 
which the great volume of the light of speculative 
superstition is refracted in a manner precisely similar to 
that of the material, every-day sun, the great refractor 
thus showing only blue devils to the dwellers in the good 
city of London, orange and green devils to the inhabitants 
of the sister (or rather step-daughter) island, and so 
forward until the seven component hues are made out 
through the other nations of the Earth. But what has 
this to do with the story ? In order to answer that 
question, the story must be told. 



THE BROWN MAN. 293 

In a lonely cabin, in a lonely glen, on the shores of a 
lonely lough, in one of the most lonesome districts of west 
Munster, lived a lone woman named Guare. She had a 
beautiful girl, a daughter named Nora. Their cabin was 
the only one within three miles round them every way. 
As to their mode of living, it was simple enough, for all 
tliey had was one little garden of white cabbage, and the 
had eaten that down to a few heads between them ; a sorry 
prospect in a place where even a handful of prishoc weed 
was not to be had without sowing it. 

It was a very fine morning in those parts, for it was 
only snowing and hailing, when Nora and her mother were 
sitting at the door of their little cottage, and laying out 
pians for the next day's dinner. On a sudden, a strange 
horseman rode up to the door. He was strange in more 
ways than one. He was dressed in brown, his hair was 
brown, his eyes were brown, his boots were brown, he 
rode a brown horse, and he was followed by a brown dog. 

"I'm come to marry you, Nora Guare", said the 
Brown Man. 

" Ax my mother fust, if you plaise, sir", said Nora 
dropping him a curtsey. 

" You'll not refuse, ma'am", said the Brown Man to the 
old mother. " 1 have money enough, and I'll make your 
daughter a lady, with servants at her call, and all manner 
of fine doings about her". And so saying, he flung a 
purse of gold into the widow's lap. 

" Why then the Heavens speed yon and her together, 
take her away with you, and make much of her", said the 
old mother, quite bewildered with all the money. 

" Agh, agh", said the Brown Man, as he placed her on 
his horse behind him without more ado. " Are you all 
ready now ?" 

" I am !" said the bride. The horse snorted, and the 
dog barked, and almost before the word was out of her 
mouth, they were all whisked away out of sight. After 



294 THE BROWN MAN. 

travelling a day and a night, faster than the wind itself 
the Brown Man pulled up his horse in the middle of the 
Mangerton mountain, in one of the most lonesome places 
that eye ever looked on. 

" Here is my estate", said the Brown Man. 

" A'then, is it this wild bog you call an estate ?" said 
the bride. 

" Come in, wife ; this is my palace", said the bride- 
groom. 

" What ! a clay hovel, worse than my mother's 7" 

They dismounted, and the horse and the dog disap- 
peared in an instant, with a horrible noise, which the girl 
did not know whether to call snorting, barking, or laugh- 
ing. 

" Are you hungry ?" said the Brown Man. " If to, 
there is your dinner". 

" A handful of raw white-eyes,* and a grain of salt !" 

" And when you are sleepy, here is your bed", he con- 
tinued, pointing to a little straw in a corner, at sight of 
which Nora's limbs shivered and trembled again. It may 
be easily supposed that she did not make a very hearty 
dinuer that evening, nor did her husband neither. 

In the dead of the night, when the clock of Mucruss 
Abbey had just tolled one, a low neighing at the door, 
and a soft barking at the window, were heard. Nora 
feigned sleep. The Brown Man passed his hands over her 
eyes and face. She snored. " I'm coming", said he, and 
he rose gently from her side. In half an hour after, she 
felt him by her side again. He was cold as ice. 

The next night the same summons came. The Brown 
Man rose. The wife feigned sleep. He returned cold. 
The morning came. 

The next night jame. The bell tolled at Mucruss, 
and was heard across the lakes. The Brown Man rose 
* A kind of potato. 



THE BROWN MAM. S95 

again, and passed a light before the eyes of the feigning 
sleeper. None slumber so sound as they who will no: 
wake. Her heart trembled; but her frame was quiet 
and firm. A voice at the door summoned the hus- 
band. 

" You are very long coming. The earth is tossed up, 
and I am hungry. Hurry! Hurry! Hurry ! if you would 
not lose all". 

" I'm coining", said the Brown Man. Nora rose and 
followed instantly. She beheld him at a distance winding 
through a lane of frost-nipt sallow trees. He often paused 
and looked back, and once or twice retraced his steps to 
within a few yards of the tree, behind which she had 
shrunk. The moon-light, cutting the shadow close and 
dark about her, afforded the best concealment. He again 
proceeded, and she followed. In a few minutes they 
reached the old Abbey of Mucruss. With a sickening 
heart she saw him enter the church-yard. The wind 
rushed through the huge yew-tree and startled her. She 
mustered courage enough, however, to reach the gate of 
the church-yard and look in. The Brown Man, the horse, 
and the dog, were there by an open grave, eating some- 
thing, and glancing their brown, fiery eyes about in every 
direction. The moon-light shone full on them and her. 
Looking down towards her shadow on the earth, she 
stared with horror to observe it move, although she was 
herself perfectly still. It waved its black arms and mo- 
tioned her back. What the feasters said, she understood 
not, but she seemed still fixed in the spot. She looked 
once more on her shadow ; it raised one band, and pointed 
the way to the lane ; slowly rising from the ground, and 
confronting her, it walked rapidly off in that direction. She 
followed as quickly as might be. 

She was scarcely in her straw, when the door creaked 
behind, and her husband entered, iie lay down by her 
aide, and started. 



296 THE BROWN MAW. 

" Uf ! Uf !" said she, pretending to be just awakened, 
"how cold you are, my love!" 

"Cold, magh? Indeed you're not very warm your- 
self, ray dear, I'm thinking". 

" Little admiration I should'nt be warm, and you laving 
me a!one this way at night, till my blood is snow broth, 
no less". 

" U uiph !" said the Brown Man, as he passed his arm 
round her waist. "Ha! your heart is beating fast?" 

" Little admiration it should. I am not well, indeed. 
Them pzaties and salt don't agree with me at all". 

" Umpli !" said the Brown Man. 

The next morning as they were sitting at the break- 
fast-table together, Nora plucked up a heart, and asked 
leave to go to her mother. The Brown Man, who eat 
nothing, looked at her in a way that made her think he 
knew all. She felt her spirit die away within her. 

"If you only want to see your mother", said he, u there 
is no occasion for your going home. I will bring her to 
you here. I didn't marry you to be keeping you gadding". 

The Brown Man then went out and whistled for his 
dog and his horse. They both came ; and in a very few 
minutes they pulled up at the old widow's cabin-door. 

The poor woman was very glad to see her son-in-law, 
though she did not know what could bring him so soon. 

" Your daughter sends her love to you, mother", says 
the Brown Man, the villain, " and she'd be obliged to you 
for a loand of a shoot of your best clothes, as she's 
going to give a grand party, and the dress-maker has 
disappointed her". 

"To be sure and welcome", said the mother; and 
making up a bundle of the clothes, she put them into his 
hands. 

" Whogh ! whogh !" said the horse as they drove off, 
M that was well done. Are we to have a meal of her ?" 

"Easy, ma-coppuleen, and you'll get your 'nough 



THE BROWN MAN. 297 

before night," saia the Brown Man, " and you likewise, 
ray little dog." 

" Boh ?" cried the dog, " I'm in no hurry — I hunted 
down a doe this morning that was fed with milk from the 
horns of the moon." 

Often in the course of that day did Nora Guare go to 
the door, and cast her eye over the weary flat before it, to 
discern, if possible, the distant figures of her bridegroom 
and mother. The dusk of the second evening found her 
alone in the desolate cot. She listened to every sound. 
At length the door opened, and an old woman, dressed in 
a new jock, and leaning on a staff", entered the hut. " O 
mother, are you come ?" said Nora, and was about to rush 
into her arms, when the old woman stopped her. 

" Whist ! whist ! my child ! — I only stepped in before 
the man to know how you like him ? Speak softly in 
dread he'd hear you — he's turning the horse loose in the 
swamp abroad, over." 

" O mother, mother ! such a story !" 

" Whist ! easy again — how does he use you ?" 

" Sorrow worse. That straw my bed, and them white- 
eyes — and bad ones they are— all my diet. And 'tisn't 
that same, only " 

" Whist ! easy, again 1 He'll hear you, may be — 
Well ?" 

" I'd be easy enough, only for his own doings. Listen, 
mother. The fust night I came, about twelve o'clock " 

" Easy, speak easy, eroo !" 

" He got up at the call of the horse and the dog, and 
Btaid out a good hour. He ate nothing next day. The 
second night, and the second day, it was the same story. 
The third " 

" Husht ! husht 1 Well the third night ?" 

" The third night I said I'd watch him. Mother, don't 

hold my hand so hard He got up, and I got up after 

him Oh, don't laugh, mother, for 'tis frightful 1 

13* 



298 THE BROWN KAN. 

followed him to Mucruss church-yard Mother, mother 

you hurt my hand 1 looked in at the gate — there was 

great moonlight there, and I could see everything as plain 
as day." 

" Well, darling— husht ! softly ! What did you see P 1 

"My husband by the grave, and the horse, 

Turn your head aside, mother, for your breath is very 

hot — —and the dog, and they eating. Ah, you are 

not my mother !" shrieked the miserable girl, as the Brown 
Man flung off his disguise, and stood before her, grinning 
worse than a blacksmith's face through a horse-collar. 
He just looked at her one moment, and then darted his 
long fingers into her bosom, from which the red blood 
snouted in so many streams. She was very soon out of 
all pain, and a merry supper the horse, the dog, and th« 
Brown Man had that night by all accounts. 



OWNEY AND OWNET-NA-PEAK. 



Ay, many, sir, there's mettle in this young fellow ; 
What a sheep's look his elder brother has ! 

Fletcheb's Elder Brother. 



When Ireland had kings of her own — when there was nc 
such thing as a coat made of red cloth in the country — 
when there was plenty in men's houses, and peace and 
quietness at men's doors (and that is a long time since) — 
there lived, in a village not far from the great city of 
Lumneach,* two young men, cousins : one of them named 
Owney, a smart, kind-hearted, handsome youth, with limb 
of a delicate form, and a very good understanding. His 
cousin's name was Owney too, and the neighbours 
christened him Owney-na-peak (Owney of the nose), on 
account of a long nose he had got — a thing so oat of 
all proportion, that after looking at one side of his face, if 
was a smart morning's walk to get round the nose and 
take a view of the other (at least, so the people used to 
say). He was a stout, able-bodied fellow, as stupid as a 
beaten hound, and he was, moreover, a cruel tyrant to 
his young cousin, with whom he lived in a kind of 
partnership. 

Both these were of an humble station. They were 
smiths — whitesmiths — and they got a good deal of 
business to do from the lords of the court, and the 

* The present Iamerick. 



800 OWNEY AND OWNEY-NA-PEAK, 

knights, and all the grand people of the city. But one 
day young Owney was in town, he saw a great pro- 
cession of lords, and ladies, and generals, and gi eat people, 
among whom was the king's daughter of the court — and 
eurely it is not possible for the young rose itself to be so 
beautiful as she was. His heart fainted at her fight, and 
he weut home desperately in luve, and not at all disposed 
to business. 

Money, he was told, was the surest way of getting ac- 
quainted with the king, and so he began saving until he 
had put together a few hogs* but Owney-na-peak finding 
where he had hid them, seized on the whole, as he used 
to do on all young Owney's earnings. 

One evening young Owney 's mother found herself 
about to die, so she called her sou to her bed-side and 
said to him : " You have been a most dutiful good son, 
and 'tis proper you should be rewarded for it. Take this 
china cup to the fair — there is a fairy gift upon it — use 
your own wit — look about you, and let the highest bidder 
have it — and so, my white-headed boy, God bless you !" 

The young man drew the little bed-curtain down ove* 
his dead mother, and in a few days after, with a heavy 
heart, he took his china cup, and set off to the fair of 
Garryowen. 

The place was merry enough. The field that is callea 
Gallows Green now, was covered with tents. There was 
plenty of wine (potteen not being known in these days, ler 
alone parliament) — a great many handsome girls — and 'tis 
unknown all the keoh that was with the boys and them- 
selves. Poor Owney walked all the day through the fair. 
wishing to try his luck, but ashamed to offer his china cup 
among all the fine things that were there ftr gale. 
Evening v as drawing on at last, and he was thinkiug of 
going home, when a strange man tapped him on the 
ehoulder, and said : " My good youth, T have been marking 

•A hog. Is. Id. 



OWNEY AND OWNET-NA-PEAK. 801 

you through the fair the whole day, going about with that 
cup in your hand, speaking to nobody, and looking as if 
you would be wanting something or another." 

" I'm for selling it," said Owney. 

" What is it you're for selling, you say ?" said a second 
man, coming up, and looking at the cup. 

" Why then," said the first man, " and what's that to 
you, for a prying meddler, what do you want to know is 
it he's for selling ?" 

" Bad manners to you (and where's the use of my 
wishing you what you have already ?) haven't I a right to 
ask the price of what's in the fair ?" 

" E'then, the knowledge o' the price is all you'll have 
for it," says the first. *' Here, my lad, is a golden piece 
for your cup." 

" That cup shall never hold drink or diet in your house, 
please Heaven," says the second ; " here's two gold pieces 
for the cup, lad". 

" Why, then, see this now — if I was forced to fill it to 
the rim with gold before I could call it mine, you shall 
never hold that cup between your fingers. Here, boy, do 
you mind me, give me that, once for all, and here's ten 
gold pieces for it, and say no more". 

" Ten gold pieces for a china cup !" said a great lord of 
the court, that just rode up at that minute, " it must 
surely be a valuable article. Here, boy, here's twenty 
pieces for it, and give it to my servant". 

" Give it to mine", cried another lord of the party, 
" and here's my purse, where you will find ten more 
And if any man offers another fraction for it to outbid 
that, I'll spit him on my sword like a snipe". 

" I outbid him", said a fair young lady in a veil, by his 
side, flinging twenty golden pieces more on the ground. 

There was no voice to outbid the lady, and young 
Owney, kneeling, gave the cup into her hands. 

" Fifty gold pieces for a china cup !" said Ownev t<j 



302 OWNEY AND OWNET-HA-PEAK. 

himself, as he plodded on home, "that was not worth 
two ! Ah ! mother, you knew that vanity had an open 
hand." 

But as he drew near home, he determined to hide his 
money somewhere, knowing, as he well did, that his 
cousin would not leave him a single cross to Mess himself 
with. So he dug a little pit, and buried all but two 
pieces, which he brought to the house. His cousin, know- 
ing the business on which he had gone, laughed heartily 
when he saw him enter, and asked him what luck he had 
got with his punch-bowl. 

" Not so bad, neither," says Owney. " Two pieces of 
gold is not a bad price for an article of old china." 

" Two gold pieces, Owney, honey ! erra, let us see 
'em, may be you would ?" He took the cash from Owney's 
hand, and after opening his eyes in great astonishment at 
the sight of so much money, he put them into his pocket. 

" Well, Owney, I'll keep them safe for you, in my 
pocket within. But tell us, may be you would, how 
come you to get such a mort o' money for an old cup o' 
painted chaney, that wasn't worth, may be, a fi'penny bit ?** 

" To get into the heart o' the fair, then, free and easy, 
and to look about me, and to cry old china, and the first 
man that come up, he to ask me, what is it I'd be asking 
for the cup, and I to say out bold : * A hundred pieces of 
gold,' and he to laugh hearty, and we to huxter together 
till he beat me down to two, and there's the whole way of 
it all." 

Owney-na-peak made as if he took no note of this, but 
next morning early he took an old china saucer himself 
had in his cupboard, and off he set, without saying a word 
to anybody, to the fair. You may easily imagine that it 
created no small surprise in the place, when they heard a 
great big fellow, with a china saucer in his hand, crying 
out : " A raal chaney saucer going for a hundred pieces of 
goold I raal chaney — who'll be buying ?" 



OWNEf AND OWNEY-NA-PEAK* 303 

**Erra. what's that you're saying, you great gomerfl?" 
•ays a man, coming up to him, and looking first at the 
saucer, and then in his face. u Is it thinking any body 
would go make a muthaun of himself to give the like for 
that saucer?" But Owney-na-peak had no answer to 
make, only to cry out: "Raal chaney! one hundred 
pieces of goold !" 

A crowd soon collected about him, and finding he would 
give no account of himself, they all fell upon him, 
beat him within an inch of his life, and after having satis- 
fied themselves upon him, they went their way laughing 
and shouting. Towards sunset he got up, and crawled 
home as well as he could, without cup or money. As 
soon as Owney saw him, he helped him into the forge, 
looking very mournful, although, if the truth must be 
told, it was to revenge himself for former good deeds of 
his cousin, that he set him about this foolish business. 

" Come here, Owney, eroo'', said his cousin, after he 
had fastened the forge door, and heated two irons in the 
fire. " You child of mischief!" said he when he had 
caught him, "you shall never see the fruits of your roguery 
again, for I will put out your eyes". And so saying, he 
snatched one of the red-hot irons from the fire. 

It was all in vain for poor Owney to throw himself on 
his knees, and ask mercy, and beg and implore forgive- 
ness : he was weak, and Owney-na-peak was strong : he 
held him fast, and burned out both his eyes. Then taking 
him, while he was yet fainting from the pain, upon his 
back, he carried him off to the bleak hill of Knock patrick,* 
a great distance, and there laid him under a tombstone, 
and went his ways. In a little time after, Owney came to 
himself. 

" sweet light of day ! what is to become of me now ?" 

* A hill in the west of the County of Limerick, on the summit of 
.vliich are the ruins of an old church, with a burying-ground stUlin 
die. The situation is exceedingly singular and bleak. 



304 OWNEY AND OWNEY-NA-PEAK. 

thought the poor lad, as he lay on his back under the 
tomb. " Is this to be the fruit cf that unhappy present ? 
Must I be dark for ever and ever ? and am I never more 
to look upon that sweet countenance, that even in mj 
blindness is not entirely shut out from me ?" He would 
have said a great deal more in this way, and perhaps more 
pathetic still, but just then he heard a great mewing, as if 
all the cats in the world wer" coming up the hill together 
in one faction. He gathered himself up, and drew back 
under the stone, and remained quite still, expecting what 
would come next. In a very short time he heard all the 
cats purring and mewing about the yard, whisking over 
the tombstones, and playing all sorts of pranks among the 
graves. He felt the tails of one or two brush his nose ; 
and well for him it was that they did not discover him 
there, as he afterwards found. At last — 

" Silence !" said one of the cats, and they were all as 
mute as so many mice in an instant. " Now, all you cats 
of this great county, small and large, gray, red, yellow, 
black, brown, mottled, and white, attend to what Tm 
going to tell you in the name of your king and the master 
of all the cats. The sun is down, and the moon is up, and 
the night is silent, and no mortal hears us, aud I may tell 
you a secret. You know the king of Munster's daughter ?" 

" yes, to be sure, and why wouldn't we ? Go on 
with your story", said all the cats together. 

" I have heard of her for one", said a little dirty-faced 
black cat, speaking after they had all done, " for I'm the 
cat that sits upon the hob of Owney and Owney-na-peak, 
the whitesmiths, and I know many's the time young 
Owney does be talking of her, when he sits by the fire 
alone, rubbing me down and planning how he can get 
into her father's court". 

" Whist ! you natural !" says the cat that was making 
the speech, " what do you think we care for your Owney, 
or Owney-na-peak ?" 



OWNEY AKD OWNET-NA-PEAK. 305 

** Murther, murther !" thinks Owney to himself, ** did 
any body ever hear the aiqual of this ?" 

" Well, gentlemen", says the cat again, " what I have 
to say is this. The king was last week struck with blind- 
ness, and you all know well, how and by what means any 
blindness may be cured. You know there is no disorder 
that can ail mortal frame, that may not be removed by 
paying a round at the well of Barrygowen* yonder, and 
the king's disorder is such, that no «tfher cure whatever 
can be had for it. Now, beware, don't let the secret pass 
one o' yer lips, for there's a great-grandson of Simon 
Mngus, that is coming down to try his skill, and he it is 
that must use the water and marry the princess, who is to 
be given to any one so fortunate as to heal her father's 
eyes ; and on that day, gentlemen, we are all promised a 
feast of the fattest mice that ever walked the ground". 
This speech was wonderfully applauded by all the cats, and 
presently after, the whole crew scampered off, jumping, and 
mewing, and purring, down the hill. 

Owney, being sensible that they were all gone, came 
from his hiding place, and knowing the road to Barry- 
gowen well, he set off, and groped his way out, and shortly 
knew, by the roaring of the waves,t rolling in from the 
point of Foynes, that he was near the place. He got to 
the well, and making a round like a good Christian, he 
rubbed his eyes with the well-water, and looking up, saw 
day dawning in the east. Giving thanks, he jumped up 
on his feet, and you may say that Owney-na-peak was 
much astonished on opening the door of the forge to find 
him there, his eyes as well or better than ever, and his 
face as merry as a dance. 

• The superstitious practice of paying rounds, with the view of 
healing diseases, at Barrygowen well, in the County of Limerick, 
is still continued, notwithstanding the exertions of the neighbouring 
Catholic priesthood, which have <iimiu ; ihed, but not abolished it 

• Of the Shannon. 



30# OWNEY AND OWNEY-NA-PEAE. 

*• Well, cousin", said Owney, smiling, " you have don« 

me the greatest service that one man can do another; yon 
put me in the way of getting two pieces of gold ", said 
he showing two he had taken from his hiding place. " If 
you could only bear the pain of suffering me just to put out 
your eyes, and lay you in the same place as you laid me, 
who knows what luck you'd have ?" 

" No, there's no occasion for putting out eyes at all, but 
could not you lay me, just as I am, to-night, in that place, 
and let me try my own fortune, if it be a thing you tell 
chruth ; and what else could put the eyes in your head, 
after I burning them out with the irons ?" 

" You'll know all that in time", says Owney, stopping 
him in his speech, for just at that minute, casting his eye 
towards the hob, lie saw the cat sitting upon it, and 
looking very hard at him. So he made a sign to Owney- 
na-peak to be silent, or talk of something else ; at which 
the cat turned away her eyes, and began washing her face, 
quite simple, with her two paws, looking now and then 
sideways into Owney's face, just like a Christian. By 
and by, when she had walked out of the forge, he shut 
the door after her, and finished what he was going to 
say, which made Owney-na-peak still more anxious than 
before to be placed under the tombstone. Owney agreed 
to it very readily, and just as they were done speaking, 
cast a glance towards the forge window, where he saw the 
imp of a cat, just with her nose and one eye peeping in 
through a broken pane. He said nothing, however, but 
prepared to carry his cousin to the place ; where, towards 
nightfall, he laid him as he had been laid himself, snug 
under the tombstone, and went his way down the hill, 
resting in Shanagolden that night, to see what would come 
of it in the morning. 

Owney-na-peak had not been more than two or three 
hours or so lying down, when he heard the very same 
noises coming up the hill, that had puzzled Owuey the 



OWHEY AND OWNET-Ni -PEAK. 807 

night before. Seeing the cats enter the church -yard, he 
began to grow very uneasy, and strove to hide himself as 
well as he could, which was tolerably well too, all being 
covered by the tombstone excepting part of the nose, 
which was so long that he could not get it to fit by any 
means. You may say to yourself, that he was not a little 
surprised, when he saw the cats all assemble like a con- 
gregation going to hear mass, some sitting, some walking 
about, and asking one another after the kittens and the like, 
and more of them stretching themselves upon the tomb- 
stones, and waiting the speech of their commander. 

Silence was proclaimed at length, and he spoke : 
"Now all you cats of this great county, small and 
large, gray, red, yellow, black, brown, mottled, or 
white, attend — " 

" Stay ! stay I* said a little cat with a dirty face, that 
just then came running into the yard. " Be silent, for 
there are mortal ears listening to what you say. I have 
run hard and fast to say that your words were overheard 
last night. I am the cat that sits upon the hob of Owney 
and Owney-na-peak, and I saw a bottle of the water of 
Barrygowen hanging up over the chimbley this morning 
in their house". 

In an instant all the cats began screaming, and mewing, 
and flying, as if they were mad, about the yard, searching 
every corner, and peeping under every tombstone. Poor 
Owney-na-peak endeavoured as well as he could to hide 
himself from them, and began to thump his breast and 
cross himself, but it was all in vain, for one of the cats 
saw the long nose peeping from under the stone, and in a 
minute they dragged him, roaring and bawling, into the 
very middle of the church-yard, where they flew upon him 
all together, and made smithereens of him, from the crown 
of his head to the sole of his feet. 

The next morning very early, young Owney came to 
the church-yard, to see what had become of his cousin. 



308 OWNET AN© OWNEY-NA-PEAK. 

He called over and over again upon his name, bat then 
was no answer given. At last, entering the place of 
tombs, he found his limbs scattered over the earth. 

" So that is the way with you, is it ?" said he, clasping 
his hands, and looking down on the bloody fragments : 
" why then, though you were no great things in the way 
of kindness to me when your bones were together, that 
isn't the reason why I'd be glad to see them torn asunder 
this morning early". So gathering up all the pieces that 
he could find, he put them into a bag he had with him, 
and away with him to the well of Banygowen, where he 
lost no time in making a round, and throwing them in, all 
in a heap. In an instant, he saw Owney-na-peak as 
well as ever, scrambling out of the well, and helping him 
to get up, he asked him how he felt himself. 

" Oh! is it how I'd feel myself you'd want to know?" 
said the other ; " easy and I'll tell you. Take that for a 
specimen !" giving him at the same time a blow on the 
head, which you may say vvas'nt long in laying Owney 
sprawling on the ground. Then without giving him a 
minute's time to recover, he thrust him into the very bag 
from which he had been just shook himself, resolving 
within himself to drown him in the Shannon at once, and 
put an end to him for ever. 

Growing weary by the way, he stopped at a shebeen 
house overright Iiubertstown Castle, to refresh himself 
with a morning, before he'd go any further. Poor Owney 
did not know whit to do when he came to himself, if it 
might be rightly called coming to himself, and the great 
bag tied up about him. His wicked cousin shot him 
down behind the door in the kitchen, and telling him he'd 
have his life surely if he stirred, he walked in to take 
something that's good in the little parlour. 

Owney could not for the life of him avoid cutting a 
hole in the bag, to have a peep about the kitchen, and seo 
whether he had no means of escape. He could see only 



OWNEY AND OWNEY-NA-PEAK. 809 

one person, a simple looking man. that was mting his 
beads in the chimney-corner, and now and then striking 
his breast, and looking up as if he was praying greatly. 

"Lord", says he, "only give me death, death, and a 
favourable judgment ! I haven't any body now to look 
after, nor any body to look after me. What's a few tin- 
pennies to save a man from want ? Only a quiet grave is 
all I ask". 

"Murther, murther!" says Owney to himself, "here's 
a man wants death and can't have it, and here am I going 
to have it, and, in troth, I don't want it at all, see". So, 
after thinking a little what he had best do, he began to 
sing out very merrily, but lowering his voice, for fear he 
should be heard in the next room : 

" To him that tied me here, 

Be thanks and praises given t 
I'll bless him night and day, 

For packing me to Heaven. 
Of all the roads you'll name, 

He surely will not lag, 
Who takes his way to Heaven 

By travelling in a bag l" 

" To Heaven ershishinf"* said the man in the chimney- 
corner, opening his mouth and his eyes ; " why then, you'd 
be doing a Christian turn, if you'd take a neighbour with 
you, that's tired of this bad and villainous world". 

"You're a fool, you're a fool!" said Owney. 

" I know I am, at least so the neighbours always tell 
me — but what hurt? May-be I have a Christian soul as 
well as another ; and fool or no fool, in a bag or out of a 
bag, I'd be glad and happy to go the same road it is you 
are talking of". 

After seeming to make a great favour of it, in order to 

allure him the more to the bargain, Owney agreed to put 

him into the bag instead of himself; and cautioning him 

Egainst sayi'ig a word, he was just going to tie him, when 

* Does he say ? 



810 OWNEY AMD OWNET-NA-PEAK. 

he was touched with a little remorse for going to have th& 
innocent man's life taken : and seeing a slip of a pig that 
was killed the day before, in a corner, hanging up, the 
thought struck him that it would do just as well to put it 
in the bag iu their place. No sooner said than done, to 
the great surprise of the natural, he popped the pig into 
the bag, and tied it up. 

" Now", says he, " my good friend, go home, say 
nothing, but bless the name in Heaven for saving your 
life ; and you were as near losing it this morning, as ever 
man was that did'nt, now". 

They left the house together. Presently out comes 
Owney-na-peak, very hearty ; and being so, he was not 
a')le to perceive the difference in the contents of the bag, 
but hoisting it upon his back, he sallied out of the house. 
Before he had gone far, he came to the rock of Foynes, 
from the top of which he flung his burden into the salt 
waters. 

Away he went home, and knocked at the door of the 
forge, which was opened to him by Owney. You may 
fancy him to yourself crossing and blessing himself over 
and over again, when he saw, as he thought, the ghost 
standing before him. But Owney looked very merry, and 
told him not to be afraid. " You did many is the good 
turn in your life", says he, "but the equal of this never". 
So he up and told him that he found the finest place in the 
world at the bottom of the waters, and plenty of money. 
" See these four pieces for a specimen", showing him some 
he had taken from his own hiding hole : " what do you 
think of that for a story ?" 

" Why then that it's a dhroll one, no less ; sorrow bit 
av I wouldn't have a mind to try my luck in the same 
way ■, how did you come home here before me that took 
the straight road, and didn't stop for so much as my 
guMhak* since I left Knockpatrick ?" 

* Literally— tvalk m. 



OWNET AND OWNEY- NA-PEAK. 311 

a Oh, there's a short cut under the waters*, said 
Owney. " Mind and only be civil while you're in Thierna- 
oge, and you'll make a sight o' money". 

Well became Owney, he thrust his cousin into the bag, 
tied it about him, and putting it into a car that wad 
returning after leaving a load of oats at a corn-store in 
the city, it was not long before he was at Foynes again. 
Here he dismounted, and going to the rock, he was, I am 
afraid, half inclined to start his burden into the wide 
water, when he naw a small skiff making towards the 
point. He hailed her, and learned that she was about to 
board a great vessel from foreign parts, that was sailing 
out of the river. So he went with his bag on board, and 
making his bargain with the captain of the ship, he left 
Owney-na-peak aiong with the crew, and never was troubled 
with him after, from that day to this. 

As he was passing by Barrygowen well, he filled i 
bottle with the water ; and going home, he bought a fine 
suit of clothes with the rest of the money he had buried, 
and away he set off in the morning to the city of Lumneach. 
He walked through the town, admiring everything he saw, 
until he came before the palace of the king. Over the 
gates of this he saw a number of spikes, with a head of a 
man stuck upon each, grinning in the sunshine. 

Not at all daunted, he knocked very boldly at the 
gate, which was opened by one of the guards of the palace. 
" Well ! who are you, friend ?" 

** I am a great doctor that's come from foreign parts to 
cure the kiug's eyesight. Lead me to his presence this 
minute ". 

" Fair and softly ", said the soldier. " Do yon see all 
those heads that are stuck up there? Your's is very 
likely to be keeping company by them, if you are so foolish 
as to come inside those walls. They are the heads of all 
the doctors in the land that came before you ; and that'g 



919 OWNEY AND OWNEY-NA-PEAK. 

what makes the town so fine and healthy this time pis\ 
praised be Heaven for the same !" 

"Don't be talking, you great gomeril", says Owney, 
"only bring me to the king at once". 

He was brought before the king. After being warned 
of his fate if he should fail to do all that he undertook, 
the place was made clear of all but a few guards, and 
Owney was informed once more, that if he should re- 
store the king's eyes, he should wed with the princess, 
and have the crown after her father's death. This put 
him in great spirits, and after making a round upon his 
bare knees about the bottle, he took a little of the water, 
and rubbed it into the king's eyes. In a minute he 
jumped up from his throne and looked about him as well 
as ever. He ordered Owney to be dressed out like a king's 
son, and sent word to his daughter that she should receive 
him that instant for her husband. 

You may say to yourself that the princess, glad as she 
was of her father's recovery, did not like this message. 
Small blame to her, when it is considered that she never 
set her eyes upon the man himself. However, her mind 
was changed wonderfully when he was brought before her, 
covered with gold and diamonds, and all sorts of grand 
things. Wishing, however, to know whether he had as 
good a wit as he had a person, she told him that he 
should give her, on the next morning, an answer to two 
questions, otherwise she would not hold him worthy of her 
hand. Owney bowed, and she put the questions as 
follows : 

" What is that which is the sweetest thing in the 
world ?" 

" What are the three most beantifnl objects in the 
creation ?" 

These were puzzling questions ; but Owney having a 
•mall share of brains of his own, was not long in forming 
an opinion upon the matter. He was very impatient fof 



OWNEY AND OWNEY-NA-PEAK. &1 

the moruing ; but it came just as slow and regular as H 
he were not in the world. In a short time he was sum- 
moned to the court-yard, where all the nobles of the land 
assembled, with flags waving, and trumpets sounding, and 
all manner cf glorious doings going on. The princess was 
placed on a throne of gold near her father, and there was 
a beautiful carpet spread for Owney to stand upon while 
he answered her questions. After the trumpets were 
silenced, she put the first, with a clear sweet voice, and hi- 
replied : 

" It's salt !" says he, very stout, out. 

There was a great applause at the answer; and the 
princess owned, smiling, that he had judged right. 

" But now", said she, " for the second. What are the 
three most beautiful things in the creation ?" 

"Why", answered the young man, "here they are. 
A ship in full sail — a field of wheat in ear — and " 

What the third most beautiful thing was, all the 
people didn't hear ; but there was a great blushing and 
laughing ^.rnong the ladies, and the princess smiled and 
nodded at him, quite pleased with his wit. Indeed, many 
said that the judges of the land themselves could not have 
answered better, had they been in Owney's place ; nor 
could there be anywhere found a more likely or well-spoken 
young man. He was brought first to the king, who took 
him in his arms, and presented him to the princess. She 
could not help acknowledging to herself that his under- 
standing was quite worthy of his handsome person. Orders 
being immediately given for the marriage to proceed, they 
were made one with all speed ; and it (t is said, that before 
another year came round, the fair princess waa one of the 
most beautiful objects in the creation. 



14 



THE VILLAGE KUIN. 



Thr lake which washes the orchards of the villag* 

of , divides it from an abbey now in ruins, 

but associated with the recollection of one of those few 
glorious events which shed a scanty and occasional lustre 
on the dark and mournful tide of Irish history. At this 
foundation was educated, a century or two before the 
English conquest, Melcha, the beautiful daughter of 
O'Melachlin, a prince, whose character and conduct even 
yet afford room for speculation to the historians of his 
country. Not like the maids of our degenerate days, who 
are scarce exceeded by the men in their effeminate vanity 
and love of ornament, young Melcha joined to the tender- 
ness and beauty of a virgin the austerity and piety of a 
hermit. The simplest roots that fed the lowest of her 
father's subjects, were the accustomed food of Melcha ; a 
couch of heath refreshed her delicate limbs ; and the lark 
did not arise earlier at morn to sing the praises of his 
Maker than did the daughter of O'Melachlin. 

One subject had a large proportion of her thoughts, her 
tears and prayers — the misery of her afflicted country, for 
she had not fallen on happy days for Ireland. Some years 
before her birth, a swarm of savages from the north of 
Europe had landed on the eastern coast of the island, and 
in despite of the gallant resistance of her father (who then 
possessed the crown) and of the other chiefs, succeeded 
in establishing their power throughout the country. Thor* 



THE VILLAGE RUIN. 315 

gills, the barbarian chief who had led them on, assumed 
the sovereignty of the conquered isle, leaving, however, to 
O'Melachlin the name and insignia of royalty, while all the 
power of government was centred in himself. The history 
of tyranny scarcely furnishes a more appalling picture of 
devastation and oppressive cruelty than that which fol- 
lowed the success of this invasion. Monasteries were des- 
troyed, monks slaughtered in the shelter of their cloisters ; 
cities laid waste and burnt; learning almost exterminated; 
and religion persecuted with a virulence peculiar to the 
gloomy and superstitious character of the oppressors. His- 
torians present a minute and affecting detail of the enor- 
mities which were perpetrated in the shape of taxation, 
restriction, and direct aggression. The single word 
Tyranny, however, may convey an idea of the whole. 

Astonished at these terrible, events, O'Melachlin, thougn 
once a valiant general, seemed struck with some base palsy 
of the soul that rendered him inseusible to the groans and 
tortures of his subjects, or to the barbarous cruelty of the 
monster who was nominally leagued with him in power. 
Apparently content with the shadow of dominion left him, 
and with the security afforded to those of his own house- 
hold, he slept upon his duties as a king and as a man, and 
thirty years of misery rolled by without his striking a 
blow, or even to all appearance forming a wish for the de- 
liverance of his afflicted country. It was not till lie was 
menaced with the danger of sharing the affliction of his 
people that he endeavoured to remove it. 

Such apathy it was which pressed upon the mind of 
Melcha, and filled her heart with shame and with afflic- 
tion. A weak and helpless maid, she had, however, 
nothing but her prayers to bestow upon her country, nor 
were those bestowed in vain. At the age of fifteen, rich 
in virtue as in beauty and in talent, she was recalled 
from those cloisters whose shadows still are seen at even- 
fall reflected in the waters of the lake, to grace the 



316 THE VILLAGE BURT. 

phantom court of her degenerate father. The latter, proud 
of his child, gave a splendid feast in honour of her return, 
to which he was not ashamed to invite the oppressor of 
his subjects and the usurper of his own authority. The 
coarser vices are the usual concomitants of cruelty. Thor- 
gills beheld the saintly daughter of his host with other 
eyes than those of admiration. Accustomed to mould the 
wishes of the puppet monarch to his own, he tarried 
not even the conclusion of the feast, but desiring the 
company of O'Melachlin on the green without the palace, 
he there disclosed to him, with the bluntness of a barbarian 
and the insolence of a conqueror, his infamous wishes. 

Struck to the soul at what he heard, O'Melachlin was 
deprived of the power of reply or utterance. For the 
first time since he had resigned to the iuvader the power 
which had fallen so heavy on the land, his feelings 
were awakened to a sense of sympathy, and s elf- interest 
made him pitiful The cries of bereaved parents, to 
which till now his heart had been impenetrable as a wall 
of brass, found sudden entrance to its inmost folds, and a 
responsive echo amid its tenderest strings. He sat for a 
time upon a bench close by, with his forehead resting on 
his hand, and a torrent of tempestuous feelings rushing 
through his bosom. 

" What sayest thou ?" asked the tyrant, after a long 
silence. " Shall I have my wish? No answer! Hearest 
thou, slave ? What insolence keeps thee silent ?" 

" I pray you, pardon me ", replied the monarch, " I 
was thinking then of a sore annoyance that has lately bred 
about our castle. I mean that rookery yonder, the din of 
which even now confouuds the music of our feast, and 
invades with its untimely harshness our cheering and 
most singular discourse. I would I had some mode of 
banishing that pest — I would I had some mode — I would 
1 had". 

" Ho 1 was that all the subject ot thy thought ?" said 



THE VILLAGE RUIN. 817 

\ 

Thorgill8— "why, fool! thou never wilt be rid of them til\ 
thou liast burned the nests wherein they breed " 

" I thank thee ", answered the insulted parent ; " I'll 
take thy counsel. I'll burn the nests. Will you walk 
into the house ?" 

" What first of my request ?" said Thorgills. " Tell 
me that ". 

" If thou hadst asked of me ", replied the king, " a 
favourite hobby for the chase, or a hound to guard thy 
threshold, thou wouldst not think it much to grant a week 
at least for preparing my heart to part with what it loved. 
How much more, when thy demand reaches to the child 
of my heart, the only offspring of a mother who died 
before she had beheld her offspring ". 

" A week, then let it be ", said Thorgills, looking 
with contempt upon the starting tears of the applicant. 

"A week would scarce suffice", replied the monarch, 
"to teach my tongue in what language it should com- 
municate a destiny like this to Melcha ". 

" What time wouldst thou require, then ?" cried the 
tyrant hastily. 

"Thou seest", replied the king, pointing to the new 
moon, which showed its slender crescent above the wood- 
crowned hills that bounded in the prospect. " Before that 
thread of light that g '.mmers now upon the distant lake, 
like chastity on beauty, has fulfilled its changes, thou 
shalt receive my answer to this profiler". 

" Be it so", said Thorgills ; and the conversation 
ended. When the guests had all departed, the wretched 
monarch went into his oratory, where he bade one of his 
followers order Melcha to attend him. She found him 
utterly depressed, and almost incapable of forming a de- 
sign. Having commanded the attendants to withdraw, 
he endeavoured, but in vain, to make known to the 
astonished princess the demand of the usurper. He r&- 
ncmbcred her departed mother, and he thought of her own 



818 THE VILLAGE RUIN. 

sanctity, and more than all, he remembered his helpless 
condition, and the seeming impossibility of doing anything 
within the time to remove from his own doors the misery 
which had already befallen so many of his subjects, without 
meeting any active sympathy from him. Was this the 
form which he was to resign into a ruffian's hands ? Was 
it for such an end he had instilled into her delicate mind the 
principles of early virtue and Christian piety ? By degrees, 
as he contemplated his situation, hi3 mind was roused oy 
the very nature of the exigency to devise the means of its 
removal. He communicated both to Melcha, and was not 
disappointed in her firmness. With a zeal beyond her 
sex, she prepared to take a part in the desperate counsels 
of her father, and the still more desperate means by which 
he proposed to put them into execution. Assembling the 
officers of his court, he made known to all, in the presence 
of his daughter, the flagrant insult which had been offered 
to their sovereign, and obtained the ready pledge of all to 
peril their existence in the furtherance of his wishes. He 
unfolded in their sight the green banner of their country, 
which had now for more than thirty years lain hid 
amongst the wrecks of their departed freedom, and while 
the memory of former glories shone warmly on their 
minds through the gloom of recent shame and recent in- 
juries, the monarch easily directed their enthusiasm to the 
point where he would have it fall, the tyranny of Thorgills 
and his countrymen. 

On the following day, the latter departed for the capital, 
where he was to await the determination of his colleague. 
Accustomed to hold in contempt the imbecility of the con- 
quered king, and hard himself at heart, he knew not what 
prodigious actions may take their rise from the impulse of 
paternal love. That rapid month was fruitful in exertion. 
Couriers were dispatched from the palace of O'Melachlin to 
many of those princes, whose suggestions for the delive- 
rance of the :*le he had long since received with apathy 



THE VILLAGE RUIN. 319 

or disregard. Plans were arranged, troops organized, and 
a general system of intelligence established throughout the 
island. It is easy to unite the oppressed against the 
oppressor. All seemed almost to anticipate the wishes of 
the sovereign, so suddenly his scheme was spread through- 
out the country. The moon rolled by, and by its latest 
glimmer a messenger was dispatched to the capital to 
inform the tyrant that O'Melachlin would send his daughter 
to meet him at whatever place he should appoint. 

There was an island on the lake in Meath, in which 
Thorgills had erected a lordly palace, surrounded by the 
richest woods, and affording a delicious prospect of the 
lake and the surrounding country. Hither the luxurious 
monarch directed that the daughter of O'Melachlin should 
be sent, together with her train of fifteen noble maidens of 
the court of O'Melachlin. The address of the latter in 
seeming to accede to the wishes of the tyrant, is preserved 
amongst the annals of the isle. It requested him to con- 
sider whether he might not find elsewhere some object 
more deserving of his favour than " that brown girl", and 
besought him to remember " whose father's child she wag". 

Far from being touched by this appeal, the usurper, on 
the appointed day, selected in the capital fifteen of the 
most dissolute and brutal of his followers, with whom he 
arrived at evening at the rendezvous. It was a portentous 
night for Ireland. Even to the eyes of the tyrant and 
his gang, half blinded as they were to all but their own 
hideous thoughts, there appeared something gloomy and 
foreboding in the stillness of nature, and seemed even to 
pervade the manners of the people. The villages were 
silent as they passed, and there appeared in the greeting 
of the few they met upon the route an air of deep-seated 
and almost menacing intelligence. 

Meantime, with feelings widely different and an anxiety 
that even the greatness of the enterprize and the awakened 
spirit of heroism could not wholly subdue, O'Melachlin 



820 THE VILLAGE RUIN. 

prepared himself for the painful task }f bidding farewell 
to his beloved daughter. Melcha, already aware of his 
design, awaited with the deepest anxiety, yet mingled 
with a thrilling hope, the approach of the auspicious 
moment that was to crown her ardent and long- 
cherished wishes or to dash them to the earth for ever. 
Alone, in her royal father's oratory, she lay prostrate 
before the marble altar, and wet with floods of tears the 
solid pavement at its base. She praved not like a fanatic 
or a worldling, but like one who understood with a feeling 
mind the real miseries of her country, and knew that she 
addressed a power capable of removing tliem. The step 
of her father at the porch of the oratory aroused the 
princess from her attitude of devotion. She stood up 
hastily upon her feet, like one prepared for enterprise, and 
waited the speech of O'Melaclilin. He came to inform 
her that all was ready for her departure, and conducted 
her into an adjoining chamber, that he might bid her 
farewell. The father and daughter embraced in silence 
and with tears. Believing from the error of the light 
that she looked pale as she stood before him, he took her 
hand and pressed it in an encouraging manner. 

" Follow me", he said, " my child, and thou shalt see 
how little cause thou hast to fear the power of this Nor- 
wegian Holofernes". 

The king conducted her into another room, where stood 
fifteen young maidens, as it seemed, and richly attired. 

"Thou seest these virgins, Melcha", said the monarch. 

" Their years are like thine own, but under every cloak 
is a warrior's sword, and they do not want a warrior's 
hand to wield it, for all that is woman of them is their 
dress. Dost thou think", he added tenderly, " that thou 
hast firmness for such a task as this ?" 

" I have no fear", replied his daughter. " He who put 
strength into the arm of Judith cau give courage to th« 
heart of Melcha". 



THS VILLAGE RUIN. 321 

They departed from the palace, where the anxious 
father remained a little longer, until the fast advancing 
shades of night should enable him to put the first steps of 
his design into effect. As soon as the earliest stars 
began to glimmer on the woods of Meath, he took from 
its recess the banner which so long had rested idle and in- 
glorious in his hall, and the brazen sword which was once 
the constant companion of his early successes and defeats, 
but which now had not left its sheath since he received a 
visionary crown from Thorgills. Girding the weapon to 
his side, he drew the blade with tears of shame and sor- 
row, imprinted a kiss upon the tempered metal, and has- 
tened with reviving hope and energy to seek the troop who 
awaited him in the adjoining wood. Mounting in haste, 
they hurried along through forests and defiles which were 
in many places thronged with silent multitudes, armed, 
and waiting but the signal word to rush to action. They 
halted near the borders of the lake of Thorgills, where a 
number of currachs, or basket boats, were moored under 
shelter of the wood. After holding a council of war, and 
allotting to the several princes engaged their parts in the 
approaching enterprise, O'Melachlin remained on the shore, 
casting from time to time an anxious eye to the usurper's 
isle, and awaiting the expected signal of his daughter. 

The princess, in the meantime, pursued her hazardous 
journey to the abode of Thorgills. The sun had already 
set before they reached the shores of the lake which sur- 
rounded the castle of the tyrant, and the silver bow of the 
expiring moon was glimmering in its pure and tranquil 
waters. A barge, allotted by Thorgills for the purpose, 
was sent to convey them to the island, and they were 
welcomed with soft music at the entrance of the palace. 
The place was lonely, the guards were few, and the blind 
security of the monarch was only equalled by his weakness. 
Besides, the revel spirit had descended from the chieftain 
to his train, and most, even of those who were in arms, 
14* 



322 THE VILLAGE RUIN. 

had incapacitated themselves for using them with any 
energy. 

Melcha and her train were conducted by a half-intoxi* 
cated slave to an extensive hall, where they were com- 
manded to await the orders of the conqueror. The guide 
disappeared, and the princess prepared for the issue. In 
a little time, the hangings at one side of the apartment 
were drawn back, and the usurper, accompanied by his 
ruffian band, made his appearance, hot with the fumes ol 
intoxication, and staggering from the late debauch. The 
entrance of Thorgills was the signal for Melcha to prepare 
her part. All remained still while Thorgills passed from 
one to another of the silent band of maidens, and paused 
at length before the " brown girl", for whom O'Melachlin 
had besought his pity. A thrill of terror shot through the 
heart of Melcha as she beheld the hand of the wretch 
about to grasp her arm. 

" Down with the tyrant !" she exclaimed, in a voice 
that rung like a bugle call. " Upon him, warriors, in the 
name of Erin ! Bind him, but slay him not !" 

With a wild " Farrah !" that shook the roof and walls 
of the abhorred dwelling, the youths obeyed the summons 
of the heroine. The tornado bursts not sooner from the 
bosom of an eastern calm, than did the band of warriors 
from their delicate disguise at the sound of those beloved 
accents. Their swords for an instant gleamed unstained 
on high, but when next they rose into the air they smoked 
with the streaming gore of the oppressors. Struck power- 
less by the charge, the tyrant and his dissolute crew were 
disabled before they had even time to draw a sword. 
Thorgills was seized alive, and bound with their scarfs 
and bands, while the rest were hewed to pieces, without 
pity, on the spot. While this was done, the heroic 
Melcha, seizing a torch which burned in the apartment, 
rushed swiftly from the palace. The affrighted guards 
believing it to be some apparition, gave way as she ap- 



THE VILLAGE RUIN. 823 

proached, and suffered her to reach the borders of th« 
lake, where she waved the brand on high, forgetting in 
the zeal of liberty her feminine character, and more re* 
eembling one of their own war-goddesses than the peace- 
ful Christian maiden, whose prayers and tears, till now, 
had been her only weapons. Like a train to which a 
spark has been applied, a chain of beacon-fires sprang up 
from hill to hill of the surrounding country, amid the 
shouts of thousands gasping for the breath of freedom, 
and hailing that feeble light as its arising star. The boats 
of O'Melachlin, shooting like arrows from the surrounding 
shores, darkened the surface of the lake, and the foremost 
reached the isle before the guards of the tyrant, stupefied 
by wine and fear, had yet recovered courage to resist. 
They were an easy prey to O'Melachlin and his followers ; 
nor was the enterprise thus auspiciously commenced, per- 
mitted to grow cold until the power of the invaders was 
destroyed throughout the isle, and Melcha had the happi- 
ness to see peace and liberty restored to her afflicted 
country. 

In the waters of that lake which so often had borne the 
usurper to the lonely scene of his debaucheries, he was con- 
signed amidst the acclamations of a liberated people to a 
nameless sepulchre, and the power he had abused once 
more reverted to its rightful owner. 

In one thing only did the too confiding islanders neglect 
to profit by the advice of Thorgills himself. They did not 
bum the nests. They suffered the strangers still to possess 
the sea-port towns and other important holds throughout 
the isle ; an imprudence, however, the effect of which did 
not appear till the reign of O'Melachlin was ended by his 
death. 

The reader may desire to know what became of the 
beautiful and heroic princess who had so considerable a 
share in the restoration of her country's freedom. As this 
had been the only Earthly object of her wishes, even from 



824 THE VILLA 3E RUIN. 

childhood, with its accomplishment was en led all that sh« 
desired on Earth. Rejecting the crowds of noble and 
wealthy suitors who ardently sought her hand, and pre- 
ferring the solitude of her own heart to the splendours and 
allurements of a court, she besought her father, as a re- 
compense for her ready compliance with his wishes, that 
he would allow her once more to retire into the convent 
where she had received her education, to consume her days 
in exercises of piety and virtue. Pained at her choice, 
the king, however, did not seek to thwart it ; and after 
playing her brief but brilliant part upon the theatre of the 
world, she devoted in those holy shades her virgin love 
and the residue of her days to Heaven. 

Such are the recollections that hallow the Village Ruin, 
and dignify its vicinity with the majesty of historical asso- 
ciation. The peasantry choose the giave of the royal nun 
as the scene of their devotions; and even those who look 
with contempt upon their humble piety, and regard as 
superstition the religion of the buried princess, feel the 
genial current gush within their bosoms as they pass the 
spot at evening, and think upon her sing eness of heart 
and her devoted zeal. Long may it be before feeHoga 
inch as these shall be extinguished. 



THE KNIGHT OF THE SHEEP 



CHAPTER 1. 



In the days of our ancestors it was the custom, when 
" strong farmer" had arrived at a certain degree of inde 
pendence by his agricultural pursuits, to confer upon him 
a title in the Irish language, which is literally translated, 
" The Knight of the Sheep." Though not commonly of 
nobk origin, tlose persons often exercised a kind of patri- 
archal sway, sjarce less extensive than that of many a 
feudal descendent of the Butlers or the Geraldines. 

In one of the most fertile townlands in one of our inland 
counties, lived a person of this class, bearing the name of 
Bryan Taafe. No less than three spacious tenements 
acknowledged his sway, by the culture of which he had 
acquired, in the course of a long life, a quantity of wealth 
more than sufficient for any purpose to which he might 
wish to apply it. 

Mr. Taafe had three sons, on whose education he had 
lavished all the care and expense which could have been 
expected from the most affectionate father in his walk of 
life. He had a great opinion of learning, and had fre- 
quently in his mouth, for the instruction of his children, 
such snatches of old wisdom as " Learning is better than 
houses or land," and 

" A man without learning, and wearing fine clothes, 
Is like a pig with a gold ring in his nose." 

Accordingly, the best teachers that Kerry and Limerick 
could afford weje employed to teach them the classic* 



326 THE KNIGHT OF THE SHEEP. 

mathematics, and such other branches of science and 
letters as were current in those parts. The two elder 
sons showed a remarkable quickness in all their studies ; 
but the youngest, though his favourite, disappointed both 
him and his instructors. So heavy was he at his book f 
that neither threats nor caresses could have any effect in 
making him arrive at anything like proficiency. However, 
as it did not proceed from absolute indolence or obstinacy, 
his father was content to bear with his backwardness in 
this respect, although it in some degree diminished the 
especial affection with which he once regarded him. 

One day as Mr. Taafe was walking in his garden, 
taking the air before breakfast in the morning, he called 
Jerry Fogarty, his steward, and told him he wanted to 
speak with him. 

"Jerry," says Mr. Taafe, after they had taken two or 
three turns on the walk together, " I don't know in the 
world what'll I do with Garret." 

" Why so, masther ?" 

" Ah, I'm kilt from him. You know yourself what a 
great opinion I always had o' the learning. A man, in 
fact, isn't considhered worth spakin' to in these times that 
hasn't it. 'Tis for the same raison I went to so much cost 
and trouble to get schoolin' for them three boys; and to 
be sure as for Shamus and Guillaum, I haven't any cause 
to complain, but the world wouldn't get good o' Garret. 
It was only the other mornin' I asked him who it was dis- 
covered America, and the answer he made me was, that 
he believed it was Nebuchodonezzar." 

" A' no ?" 

" 'Tis as thrue as you're standin' there. What's to be 
done with a man o' that kind ? Sure, as I often repre- 
sented to himself, it would be a disgrace to me if he was 
ever to go abroad in foreign parts, or any place o' the 
kind, and to make such an answer as that to any gentle- 
man or lady, afther all I lost by him. 'Tisn't so with 



THE KNIGHT OF THE SHEEP. 327 

Shamua and Guillaum. There isn't many goin' that could 
thrace histhory with them boys. I'd give a dale, out o' 
regard for the poor woman that's goue, if Garret could 
come any way near 'em". 

" I'll tell you what it is, masther", said Jerry , " there's 
a dale that's not over briglit at the book, an' that would 
be very 'cute for all in their own minds. May be Master 
Garret would be one o' them, an' we not to know it. I 
remember myself one Motry Hierlohee, that not one ha'- 
p'orth o' good could be got of him goin' to school, an' he 
turned out one of the greatest janiuses in the parish afther. 
There isn't his aiquals in Munsther now at a lamentation 
or the likes. Them raal janiuses does be always so full of 
their own thoughts, they can't bring themselves, as it were, 
to take notice of those of other people". 

" Maybe you're right, Jerry", answered Mr. Taafe ; 
** I'll take an opportunity of trying". 

He said no more, but in a few days after he gave a 
great entertainment to all his acquaintances, rich and poor, 
that were within a morning's ride of his own house, taking 
particular care to have every one present that had any 
name at all for " the learning". Mr. Taafe was so rich 
and so popular amongst his neighbours, that his house was 
crowded on the day appointed with all the scholars in the 
country, and they had no reason to complain of the enter- 
tainment they received from Mr. Taafe. Everything good 
and wholesome that his sheep-walk, his paddock, his 
orchard, his kitchen-garden, his pantry, and his cellar, 
could afford, was placed before them in abundance ; and 
seldom did a merrier company assemble together to enjoy 
the hospitality of an Irish farmer. 

When the dinner was over, and the guests busily occu- 
pied in conversation, the Knight of the Sheep, who sat at 
the head of the table, stood up with a grave air, as if he 
were about to address something of importance to the 
company. His venerable appearance, as he remained 



S28 THE KMGHT OF THE SHEEP. 

standing, a courteous smile shedding its light over his 
aged countenance, and his snowy hair descending almost 
to his shoulders, occasioned a respectful silence amongst 
the guests, while he addressed them in the following 
words : — 

; ' In the first place, gentlemen, I have to return you all 
thanks for giving me the pleasure of your company here 
to-day, which I do with all ray heart. And I feel the 
more honoured and gratified because I take it for granted 
you have come here, not so much from any personal feeling 
towards myself, but because you know that I have always 
endeavoured, so far as my poor means would enable me, 
to show my respect for men of parts and learning. Well, 
then, here you are all met, grammarians, geometricians, 
arithmeticians, geographers, astronomers, philosophers, 
Latinists, Grecians, and men of more sciences than perhaps 
I ever heard the names of. Now there's no doubt learning 
is a fine thing, but what good is all the learning in the 
world without what thsy call mother-wit to make use of 
it ? An ounce o' mother- wit would buy an' sell a stone- 
weight of learning at any fair in Musisther. Now there 
are you all scholars, an' here am I a poor country farmer 
that hardly ever got more teaching than to read and write, 
and maybe a course of Voster, and yet I'll be bound I'll 
lay down a problem that maybe some o' ye wouldn't find 
it easy to make out". 

At this preamble, the curiosity of the company was 
raised to the highest degree, and the Knight of the Sueep 
resumed, after a brief pause: 

" At a farm of mine, about a dozen miles from this, I 
have four fields of precisely the same soil ; one square, 
another oblong, another partly round, and another trian- 
gular. Now, what is the reason that, while I have an 
excellent crop of white eyes tins year out of the square, 
the oblong, and the round field, not a single stalk would 
grow in the triangular one ?" 



THE KNIGHT OP THE SHEEP. 829 

This problem produced a dead silence amongst the 
guests, and all exerted their understandings to discover 
the solution, but without avail, although many of their 
conjectures showed the deepest ingenuity. Some traced 
out a mysterious connection between the triangular 
boundary, and the lines of the celestial hemisphere ; 
others said, probably from the shape of the field an equal 
portion of uutrition did not flow on all sides to the seed 
60 as to favour its growth. Others attributed the failure 
to the effect of the angular hedges upon the atmosphere, 
which, collecting the wind, as it were, into corners, caused 
fuch an obstruction to the warmth necessary to vegetation, 
that the seed perished in the earth. But all their theories 
were beside the mark. 

" Gentlemen", said Mr. Taafe, " ye're all too clever — 
that's the only fault I have to find with ye'r answers. 
Shamus", he continued, addressing his eldest son, " can 
you tell the raison ?" 

"Why, then, father", said Shamus, "they didn't 
grow there, 1 suppose, because you didn't plant them 
there". 

" You have it, Shamus", said the knight ; " I declare 
you took the ball from all the philosophers. Well, gen- 
tlemen, can any o' ye tell me, now, if you wished to 
travel all over the world, from whom would you ask a 
passport ?" 

Tins question seemed as puzzling as the former. Some 
said the Great Mogul, others the Grand Signior, others the 
Pope, others the Lord Lieutenant, and some the Emperor 
of Austria ; but all were wrong. 

" What do you say, Guillaum ?" asked the knight, 
addressing his second son. 

" From Civility, father", answered Guillaum; 'tor that's 
a gentleman that has acquaintances everywhere" 

" You're right, Guillaum", replied the knight. " Well, 
I have one more question for the company. Can any one 



330 THE KNIGHT OF THE SHEEP. 

tell me in what country the women are the best house- 
keepers ?" 

Again the company exhausted all their efforts in oon 
jecture, and the geographers showed their learning by 
naming all the countries in the world, one after another 
but to no purpose. The Knight now turned with a fond 
look towards his youngest son. 

" Garret", said he, " can you tell where the women are 
good housekeepers ?" 

Garret rubbed his forehead for a while, and smiled, and 
shook his head, but could get nothing out of it. 

" I declare to my heart, father", said he, " I can't tell 
from Adam. Where the women are good housekeepers ? 
—stay a minute. Maybe", said he, with a knowing look, 
" maybe 'tis in America?" 

" Shamus, do you answer," said the knight, in a disap- 
pointed tone. 

" In the grave, father", answered Shamus, " for there 
they never gad abroad". 

Mr. Taafe acknowledged that his eldest son had once 
more judged right; and the entertainments of the night 
proceeded without further interruption, until, wearied with 
feasting and mu«ic, such of the company as could not be 
accommodated with beds, took their departure, each in the 
direction of his own home. 



CHAPTER II. 



On the following morning, in the presence of his house- 
hold, Mr. Taafe made a present to his two eldest sons of 
one hundred pounds each, and was induced to bestow th6 
same sum on Garret, although he by no means thought he 
deserved it after disgracing him as he had done before his 
guests. He signified to the young men at the same time. 



THE KNIGHT OF THE 8HE1*. 831 

that he gave thera the money as a free gift, to lay ont in 
any way they pleased, and that he never should ask them 
to repay it. 

After breakfast, the old knight, aa usual, went to taka 
ft few turns in the garden. 

" Well, Jerry ", said he, when the steward had joined 
him according to his orders ; " well, Jerry, Garret is no 
genius ". 

A groan from Jerry seemed to announce his acqui- 
escence in this decision. He did nut, however, resign 
all hope. 

"With submission to your honour", said he, "I wouldn't 
call that a fair thrial of a man's parts. A man mightn't 
be able to answer a little cran o' that kind, an' to have 
more sense for all than those that would. Wait a while 
until you'll see what use he'll make o' the hundred pounds, 
an' that'll show his sinse betther than all the riddles 
in Europe ". 

Mr. Taafe acknowledged that Jerry's proposition was 
but reasonable ; and, accordingly, at the end of a twelve- 
month, he called his three sons before him, and examined 
them one after another. 

" Well, Shamus ", said he, u what did you do witb 
your hundred pounds ?" 

"I bought stock with it, father". 

"Very good. And you, Guillaum?" 

** I laid it out, father, in the intherest of a little farm 
westwards". 

" Very well managed again. Well, Garret, let us hear 
what you did with the hundred pouuds". 

"I spent it, father", said Garret. 

"Spent it! Is it the whole hundred pounds V* 

" Sure, I thought you told us we might lay it out *w 
we liked, sir ?" 

" Is that the raison you should be such a prodigal as to 
waste the whole of it in a year ? Well, hear to me, now, 



832 THE KNIGHT OF THE SHEEP. 

the three o ye, and listen to the laison why I pnt ye to 
these trials. I'm an ould man, my children ; my hair 
is white on my head, an' it's time for me to think of 
turning the few days that are left me to the best account. 
I wish to separate myself from the world before the world 
separates itself from me. For this cause I had resolved, 
these six months bark, to give up all my property to ye 
three that are young an' hearty, an' to keep nothing for 
myself but a bed under my old roof, an' a sate at the 
table and by the fire-place, an' so to end my ould days in 
peace an' quiet. To you, Shamus, I meant to give the 
dairy-firm up in the mountains ; the Corcasses and all the 
meadowing to you, Guillaum ; and for you, Garret, I had 
the best of the whole, — that is, the house we're living in, 
and the farm belonging to it. But for what would I give 
it to you, after what you just tould me ? Is it to make 
ducks and drakes of it, as you did o' the hundhred pounds ? 
Here, Garret", said he, going to a coiner of the room and 
bringing out a small bag aud a long hazel stick ; " here's 
the legacy I have to leave you — that, an' the king's high 
road, an' my liberty to go wherever it best plases you. 
Hard enough I aimed that hundhred pounds that you 
spent so aisily. And as for the farm I meant to give you, 
I give it to these two boys, an' my blessing along with it, 
siuce 'tis they that know how to take care of it". 

At this speech the two elder sons cast themselves at 
their father's feet with tears of gratitude. 

"Yes", said he, "my dear boys, I'm rewarded for all 
the pains I ever took with ye, to make ye industrious, and 
thrifty, and everything that way. I'm satisfied, under 
Heaven, that all will go right with ye , but as for this 
boy, I have nothing to say to him. Betther for me I 
never saw his face". 

Poor Garret turned as'de his head, but he made no 
attempt to excuse himself, nor to obtain any favour from 
his rigid father. Alter wishing them all a timid farewell, 



TBE ENIGHT UP THE SHEET. 833 

which was but slightingly returned, ho took the bag and 
staff, and went about his business. 

His departure seemed to give little pain to his relatives. 
They lived merrily and prosperously, and even the old 
knight himself showed no anxiety to know what had be- 
come of Garret. In the meantime, the two elder sons got 
married ; and Mr. Taafe, in the course of a few years, had 
the satisfaction to see his grandchildren seated on his knee. 

We are often widely mistaken in our estimate of gene- 
rosity. It may appear a very noble thing to bestow 
largely; but, before we give it the praise of generosity, 
we must be sure that the motive is as good as the deed. 
Mr. Taafe began, in the course of time, to show that his 
views in bestowing his property on his two sons were not 
wholly free from selfishness. They found it harder to 
please him now that they were masters of all, than when 
they were wholly dependent on his will. His jealousies 
and murmurs were interminable. There was no providing 
against them beforehand, nor any allaying them when they 
did arise. The consequence was, the young men, who 
never really felt anything like the gratitude they had pro- 
fessed, began to consider the task of pleasing him alto- 
gether burdensome. In this feeling they were encouraged 
by their wives, who never ceased murmuring at the cost 
and trouble of entertaining him. 

Accordingly, one night while the aged kni;J was mur- 
muring at some inattention which was shown him at table, 
Shamus and Guillauin Taafe walked into the room, deter- 
mined to put an end for ever to his complaints. 

" I'd like to know what would plaise you !* exclaimed 
Shamus. "I suppose you won't stop until you'll take 
house and all from us, an' turn ua out, as you did Garret, 
to beg from doore to doore ?" 

" If I did itself, Shamus", said the knight, looking at 
hira for some moments with SUTDiite. "I'd fiCt uo luovo 
than I gave*. 



334 THE KNIGHT OF THE SHEEP. 

"What good was your giving it", cried Gnillanm, 
" when you wou't let us enjoy it with a moment's com- 
fort ?" 

" Do you talk that way to me, too, Guillaum ? If it 
was poor Garret I had, he wouldn't use me so". 

*' Great thanks he got from you for any good that was 
in him", cried one of the women. 

" Let hini take his stick and pack out to look for 
Garret", said the second woman, " since he is so fond of 
him". 

The old knight turned and looked at the women. 

" I don't wondher", said he, " at anything I'd hear ye 
say. You never yet heard of anything great or good, or 
for the public advantage, that a woman would have a 
hand in,— only mischief always. If you ask who made 
guch a road, or who built such a bridge, or wrote such a 
great histhory, or did any other good action o' the kind, 
I'li engage 'tis seldom you'll hear that it is a woman done 
it ; but if you ask who is it that set such and such a pair 
figbtin', or who is it that caused such a jewel, or who is it 
that let out such a sacret, or ran down such a man's 
character, or occasioned such a war, or brought such a 
man to the gallows, or caused diversion in such a family, 
or anything o' that kind, then, I'll engage, you'll hear that 
a woman had some call to it. We needn't have recoorse 
to histhory to know ye'r doins. 'Tis undher our eyes, 
"fwas the likes o' ye two that burned Throy, an' made the 
King o' Leinsther rebel again' Brian Boru". 

At this the two women pulled the caps off their heads, 
and set up such a screaming and shrieking as might be 
heard from thence to Cork. 

"Oh, murther! murther !" says one of them, " was it 
for this I married you, tc be compared to people o' that 
kind?" 

" What v.u son has he to me", cried the other, "that 
he'd compare me to them that would rebel again' Brian 



THE KNIGHT OF THE SHEEP. 885 

Bora ? Would I rebel again* Brian Bora, Shamus, a' 1 a 
gal?" 

" Don't heed him, a-vourneen, he's an ould man". 

" Oh, vo ! vo ! if ever I thought the likes o' thai 
would be said o' me, that I'd rebel again' Brian 
Boru !" 

" There's no use in talking, Guillaum", cried the second, 
who probably took the allusion to the fate of Troy as a 
slight on her own personal attractions ; " there's no use 
in talkin', but I never'll stay a day undher your roof with 
anybody that would say I'd burn Throy. Does he forget 
that ever he had a mother himself? Ah, 'tis a bad 
apple, that's what it is, that despises the three it sprung 
from". 

M Well, I'll tell you what it is, now", said the eldest 
son, " since 'tis come to that with you, that you won't let 
the women alone, I won't put up with any more from you. 
I believe, if I didn't show you the outside o' the doore, 
you'd show it to me before long. There, now, the world 
j.s free to you to look out for people that'll plaise you 
betther, since you say we can't do it". 

"A', Shamus, agra", said the old knight, looking at 
his son with astonishment; "is that my thanks afther 
all?" 

" Your thanks for what ?" cried Guillaum ; " is it for 
plasin' your own fancy ? or for makin' our lives miserable 
ever since, an' to give crossness to the women ?" 

" Let him go look for Garret, now", cried one of the 
women, " an' see whether they'll agree betther than they 
did before". 

"Ah — Shamus — Guillaum — a chree", said the poor 
old man, trembling with terror at sight of the open door, 
"let ye have it as ye will; I am sorry for what I said, 
a'ra gal ! Don't turn me out on the high road in my ould 
days ! I'll engage, I never'll open my mouth again' one 
o' ye again the longest day I live. A', Shamus, a-vich, 



836 THE KNIGHT OF THE SHEEP 

it isn't long I have to stay wid ye. Your own nair will 

be as white as mine yet, plaise God, an' 'twouldn't bo 
w ishin' to you then for a dale that you showed any dis- 
respect to mine". 

His entreaties, however, were all to no purpose. They 
turned him out, and made fast the door behind him. 

Imagine an old man of sixty and upwards turned out 
on the high road on a cold and rainy night, the north 
wind beating on his feeble breast, and without the 
prospect of relief before him. For a time he could not 
Lelieve that the occurrence was real; and it was only 
when he felt the rain already penetrating through his thia 
dress that he became convinced it was but too true. 

" Well", said the old man, lifting up his hands as he 
crept out on the high road, "is this what all the teaching 
come to? Is this the cleverness an' the learning? 
Well, if it was to do again ! No matther. They say 
there's two bad pays in the world — the man that pays 
beforehand, an' the man that doesn't pay at all. In like 
manner, there's two kinds of people that wrong their 
lawful heirs— those that give ihem their inheritance before 
death, and those that will it away from them afther. 
What'll I do now at all? or where'll I turn to? a poor 
old man o' my kind that isn't able to do a sthroke o' work 
if I was ever so fain ! An' the night gettin' worse an* 
worse! Easy! — Isn't that a light I see westwards?— 
There's no one, surely, except an unnatural son or 
daughter that would refuse to give an old man shelter ou 
such a night as this. I'll see if all men's hearts are as 
hard as my two sons'". 

He went to the house, which was situated at the 
distance of a quarter of a mile from that which he BO 
lately looked on as his own. As he tottered along the 
dark and miry borheen which led to the cottage door, the 
barking of a dog iiuide aroused the attention of the 
inmates. Being already in bed, however, before he had 



THE KNIGHT Of THE SHEEP. 837 

arrived there, none of thein were very willing to give 
admission to a stranger. 

** Who's there ?" cried the man of the house, as the old 
knight knocked timidly at the door. " Do you think we 
have nothing else to do at this time o' night but to be 
gettin' up an' openin' the doore to every sthroller that goes 
the road ?'' 

"Ah! if you knew who it was you had there", said the 
knight, " you wouldn't be so slow of opeuin' the doore". 

" Who 'is it I have there, then ?" 

"The Knight of the Sheep". 

" The Knight of the Sheep ! Oh, you bom villyan ! 
'Twas your son Shamus that chated me out o' thirty good 
pounds by a horse he sould me at the fair o' Killeedy — an 
animal that wasn't worth five! Go along this minute 
with you : or if you make me get up, 'tis to give you 
something that you wouldn't bargain for". 

The poor old man hunied away from the door, fearing 
that the farmer would be but too ready to put his threat 
into execution. The night was growing worse and worse. 
He knocked at another door ; but the proprietor of this in 
like manner had suffered to the extreme cleverness of 
Guillaum Taafe, and refused to give him shelter. The 
whole night was spent in going from door to door, and 
finding in every place where he applied that the great 
ability of his two sons had been beforehand with him in 
getting a bad name for the whole family. At la-t, as the 
morning began to dawu, he found himself unable to 
proceed further, and was obliged to lie down in a little 
paddock close to a very handsome farm-house. Here the 
coldness of the morning air and the keenness of his grief 
at the recollection of his children's ingratitude had such 
an effect upon him that he swooned away, and lay for a 
long time insensible upon the grass. In this condition he 
was found by the people of the house, who soon after 
tame out to look after the bounds and do their usual 
15 



338 THE KNIGHT OF IH£ SHEEP. 

farming work. They had the hnnoanity to take him Into 
the house, and to put him into a warm bed, where they 
used all proper means for his recovery. 

When he had come to himself, they asked him who he 
was, and how he had fallen into so unhappy a condition. 
For a time the old knight was afraid to answer, lest these 
charitable people, like so many others, might have been at 
one time sufferers to the roguery of his two eldest sons, 
snd thus be tempted to repent of their kindness the in- 
stant they had heard on whom it had been bestowed. 
However, fearing lest they should accuse him of duplicity 
in case they might afterwards learn the truth, he at 
length confessed his name. 

" The Knight of the Sheep !" exclaimed the woman of 
the house, with a lock of the utmost surprise and joy. 

" Oh, Tom, Tom !" she continued, calling out to her 
husband, who was in another room. " A', come here, 
asthore, until you see Misther Taafe, the father o' young 
Masther Garret, the darliu' that saved us all from ruin". 

The man of the house came in as fast as he could run. 

**Are you Garret Taafe's father?" said he, looking 
surprised at the old knight. 

" I had a son of that name", said Mr. Taafe, " though 
all I know of him now is, that I used him worse than I 
would if it was to happen again". 

" Well, then", said the farmer, " my blessing on that 
day that ever you set foot within the.se doores. The rose 
in May was never half so welcome, an' I'm betthcr 
plaised than I'll tell you, that 1 have you undher my 
roof". 

*' I'm obliged to you", said the knight , " but what's 
the raisou o' that?" 

" Your son Garret", replied the man, " of a day when 
every whole ha'p'orth we had in the world was going to 
be canted for the rent, put a hand in his pocket an' lent 
as thirty pounds till we'd be aole to pay him again, an' we 



THE KNIGHT OF THE SHEEP. £39 

not knowin' who in the world be was, nor he ns, I'm snrei 
It was only a long time afther that we found it out by 
others in various parts that he had served in like manner, 
and they told us wh© ne was. We never seen him since ; 
but I'm sure it would be the joyful day to us that we'd see 
him coming back to get his thirty pounds". 

When the old knight heard this, he felt as >■■ somebody 
wa running him through with a sword. 

' Aud this", said he, " was the way poor Garret spent 
the hundhred pounds ! Oh, murther ! murther ! my poor 
boy, what had I to do at all, to go turn you ad h rift as I 
done, for no raison ! I took the wrong for the right, an' 
the right for the wrong ! No matther ! That's the way 
the whole world is blinded. That's the way death will 
show us the differ of many a thing. murther! Garret! 
Garret ! What'll I do at all with the thoughts of it ! An' 
them two villyans that I gave it all to, an' that turned me 
out afther in my ould days, as I done by you ! No 
matther". 

He turned into the wall for fear the people would hear 
him groaning ; but the remorse, added to all his other 
Bufferings, had almost killed him. 

In a little time the old knight began to recover some- 
thing of his former strength under the care of his new 
acquaintances, who continued to show him the most de- 
voted attention. One morning the farmer came into his 
room with a large purse full of gold in his hand, and 
eaitl : 

" I told you, sir, I owed your son thirty pounds ; an' 
since he's not com in' to ax for it, you're heartily welcome 
to the use of it until he does, an' I'm sure he wouldn't 
wish to see it betther employed". 

" No, no", replied Mr. Taafe, " I'll not take the money 
from you ; but I'll borrow the whole purse for a week, ao - 
at the end o' that time I'll return it safe to you". 



340 THE KNIGHT 07 TME SHEEP 

The farmer lent bim the purse, and the knight waited 
for a fine day, when he set off again in the morning, and 
took the road leading to the dwelling from which he had 
been expelled. It was noon, and the sun was shii im, 
bright, when he arrived upon the little lawn before tin 
door. Sitting down in the sunshine by the kitchen-garden 
wall, he began counting the gold, and arranging it in a 
number of little heaps, so that it had a most imposiug 
effect. While he was thus occupied, one of his young 
daughters-in-law — the same whose beauty had drawn npon 
her the unhappy allusion to the mischief- making spouse of 
Menelaus — happened to make her appearance at the front 
door, and looking around, saw the old knight in the act of 
counting his gold in the sunshine. Overwhelmed with 
astonishment, she ran to her husband, and told him what 
she had seen. 

"Nonsense, woman !' : said Shamus; "you don't mean 
to persuade me to a thing o' that kind" 

" Very well", replied the woman, " I'm sure, if you don't 
believe me, 'tis asy for ye all to go an' see ve'rselves". 

So they all went, and peeping through the little window 
one afther another, were dazzled by the sight of so much 
gold. 

"You done very wrong, Shamus", said Guillaum, 
" ever to turn out the ould father as you done. See, now, 
what we ail lost by it. That's a part o' the money he 
laid by from year to year, an' we never'll see a penny 
of it". 

At this they all felt the greatest remorse, for the manner 
in which they had acted to the old man. However, they 
were not so much discouraged but that some of them 
ventured to approach and salute him. On seeing them 
draw nigh, he hastily concealed the gold and returned 
their greeting with an appearance of displeasure. It was 
by much persuasion, and after many assurances of their 
regret for what had passsd, that he consented once more 



THK KNIGHT OS THE 6UEKP 341 

to come and take up his abode beneath their roof, desiring 
at the same time that an ass and cart might be sent to tho 
farmer's for a strong box which he had left there. 

At the mention of a strong box, it may easily be ima- 
gined what were the sensations of his hearers. The ass 
and cart were procured without delay, and, before evening, 
those grateful children had the sati.- faction to behold a 
heavy box, of very promising dimensions, deposited in a 
corner of the small chamber which was to be reserved for 
the future use of their aged parent. 

In the meanwhile, nothing could exceed the attent'on 
which he now received from the young people, 'i ..ey 
seemed only unhappy when not occupied in contributing 
in some way to his comfort, and perceiving his remorse 
for the manner in which Garret had been treated, used 
all the means in their power to discover whither he had 
gone. But it is not always in this life that one false step 
can be retraced. The old knight was not destined to see 
his son again, and his grief at this disappointment had 
no slight effect in aggravating the infirmities of ins old age. 

At length, perceiving that he was near his end, ho 
called his sons and daughters to his bedside, and addressed 
them in the following words : — 

" Whatever cause I had once to complain of ye, Shamus 
and Guillaum, that's all past and gone now, and it is right 
that I should leave you some little remembrance for all 
the trouble I gave you since my comin' home. Do you 
see that chest over there ?" 

" Ah, father ! what chest ?" cried the sons. * 4 Don't 
be talkin' of it for a chest". 

" Well, my good boys", said the knight, " r.iy will in 
in that chest, so I need tell ye no more". 

" Don't speak of it, father", said t.K'.nn^, ''for. us the 
Latin poet says : — 

*Non possMenfem amlia 
Bccte beat mil' 



THE KNIGHT OF THE SHEEP. 

Only as you're talkin' of it at all for a chest, where*s th? 

key, father?" 

" Ah, Sliamus ! : said the knight, " yon were always 

great at the Latin. The key is in my waistcoat 

pocket". 

Soon after he expired. The two sons, impatient to inspect 

.heir treasure, could hardly wait until the old man ceased 

to breathe. While Shamus unlocked the box, Guillaum 

remained to keep the door fast. 

" Well, Shamus", said his brother, " what do you find 

there ?" 

" A parcel of stones, Guillaum I* 

" Nonsense, man ! try what's undher 'enV 

Shamus complied, and found at the bottom 01 the box 

a rope with a running noose at the end, and a scroll of 

paper, from which Shamus read the following sentence 

aloud, for the information of his brother : — 

4< The last Will and Testament of Bryan Taafe, 
commonly called the knight of the sheep. 

" Imprimis. To my two sons, Shamus and Guillaum, 
I bequeath the whole of the limestones contained in this 
box, in return for their disinterested love and care of me 
ever since the day when they saw me counting the golu 
Dear the kitchen-garden. 

' k Item. / bequeath the rope herein contained for any 
father to hang himself, who is so foolish as to give away 
his propetiy to his heirs before his death". 

u Well, Shamus", said Guillaum, " the poor father laid 
out a dale on our education, but I declare all the taichia' 
he ever gave us was nothing to that". 



THE ROCK OF THE CANDLE. 



SoTdiers. — Room, ho ! — tell Antony Brutus is ta'en 
ittfaxg.— This is not Brutus, friends; but, I assure you, 
A prize no less in worth. Keep this man safe, 
Give him all kindness. I had rather have 
Such men my friends than enemies. 

Julius Oteset\ 



Remember ye not, my fair young friend, in one of those 
excursions which rendered the summer of the past year 
bo sweet in the enjoyment and so mournful in the 
recollection — remember ye not my having pointed out to 
your observation the ruined battlements of Carrigngunniel 
(the Rock of the Candle), which shoot upward from a 
craggy hillock on the Shannon side, within view of the 
ancient city of Limerick? I told you the legend from 
which the place originally derived its name — a legend 
which I thought was distinguished (especially in the 
closing incident) by a tenderness and delicacy of imagi- 
nation, worthy of a Grecian origin. You, too, ac- 
knowledged the simple beauty of that incident ; and your 
approval induces me to hope for that of the world. 

On a misty evening in spring, when all the west is 
fihed with a hazy sunshine, and the low clouds stoop and 
cling around the hill tops, there are few nobler spectacle! 



344 THE ROCK OF THE CANDL.B. 

o contemplate, than the ruins of Carrigogunniel Castle 
Phis hue building, which was dismantled by one of 
William's generals, stands ou the very brink of a broken 
iiill, which, toward the water, looks bare and craggy, but 
>n the landward side slopes gently down under a close 
md verdant cover of elms and underwood. It is when 
seen from this side, standing high above the trees, and 
against the red and broken clouds that are gatheieu 
in the west, that the ruin assumes its most imposing 
aspect. 

Such was the look it wore on the evening of an autumn 
day when the village beauty, young Minny O'Donnell, put 
aside the woodbines from her window, and looked out upon 
the Rock. Her father's cottage was situated close to the 
foot of the hill, and the battlements seemed to frown 
downward upon it with a royal and overtopping haughti- 
ness. 

" Hoo ! murder, Minny honey, what is that you're 
doing ? Looking out at the Rock at this hour, and the 
sun just going down behind the turret?" 

" Why not, aunt ?" 

" Why not ? — Do you remember nothing of the candle?" 

"Oh, I don't know what to think of it; I am inclined 
to doubt the story very much ; I have been listening to 
that frightful tale of the Death Light since I was bom, 
and I have never seen it yet". 

" You may consider yourself fortunate in that, child, 
and I advise you not to be too anxious to prove the troth 
of the story. I was standing by the side of poor young 
Dillon myself, on the very day of his marriage, when he 
looked out upon it through the wicket, and was blasted as 
if by a thunder-stroke. 1 never will forget the anguish 
of the dear young bride : it was heart breaking to see 
her torn from his side when the life had left him. Poor 
creature ! her shrieks are piercing my ears at this very 
moment". 



THE ROCK OF THE CANDLE. 345 

u That story terrifies me, aunt. Speak ot it no more, 
and 1 will leave the window. I wonder if Coruiao knowa 
this story of the Fatal Candle". 

The good old woman smiled knowingly on her pretty 
niece, as, instead of answering her half query, stie asked 
— " Do you not expect him here before sunset ?** 

Minny turned hastily round, and seated herself opposite 
a small mirror, adorned by one of those highly carved 
frames which were popular at the toilets ol our grand- 
mammas. She did so with a double view of completing 
her evening toilet, and at the same time screening her- 
self from the inquisitive glances of her shaip old relative, 
while she continued the conversation. 

" He promised to be here before", she replied , " but it 
is a long way". 

" I hope he will not turn his eyes upon the Rock, it he 
should be detained after nightfall. I suspect, Minny 
that his eyes will be wandering in another direction. J 
think he will be safe, after all". 

" For shame, aunt Norry. You ought to be ashamed 
of yourself, an old woman of your kind to speak in that 
way. Come now, and tell me something funny, while I 
am dressing my hair, to put the recollection of tl.at fright- 
ful adventure of the Candle out of my head. Would not 
that be a good figure for a Banthee ?" she added, shaking 
out her long bright hair with one hand, in the manner 
which is often attributed to the warning spirit, and casting 
at the same time a not indifferent glance at the mirror 
above mentioned. 

" Partly, indeed, — but the Banthee (meaning no offence 
at the same time) is far from being so younger so 
blooming in the cheeks ; and by all accounts, the eyes 
tell a different story from yours — a story of death, and 
not of marriage. Merry would the Banthee be, that 
would be going to get young Mr. Corinac for a husband 
to-morrow morning earl v \ 



846 



THE BOCK OF THE CANDLE. 



" III go look at the Rock again, if you continue to talk 
such nonsense''. 

" Oh, bubboo !— rest easy, darling, and I'll say no- 
thing — Weil, what story is it I'm to be telling you ?" 
" Something funny". 

" Oyeh, my heart is bothered with 'em for stories. I 
don't know wh*t I'll tell you. Are you 'cute at all ?" 
" I dou't knnvv. Only middling, I believe". 
« Well— I'll tell you a story of a boy that flogged 
Europe for Vmeness, so that if you have a mind to be 
ready with an answer for every cross question that'll be 
put to you, yo». can learn it after him ;— a thing that may 
be useful to you one time or another, when the charge of 
the house is l<**it in your hands". 
" Well, let *ne hear it". 

' I will, tfc°n, do that. Go on with your dress, and I'll 
have niv storv done before you are ready to receive Mr. 
Cormac". 

So saying. -;he drew a stool near her niece, and leaning 
forward with her chin on her hand, commenced the fol- 
lowing tale. 

" There w»s a couple there, long ago, and they had a 
son that tbey didn't know rightly what was it they'd do 
with him, for they had not money to get him Latin enough 
for a priest, and there was only poor call for day labourers 
in the country. * I'll tell you what I'll do', says the father, 
says he; < I'll make a thief of him', says he; 'sorrow a 
better trade there is going than the roguery, or more 
money-making for a boy that would be industrious'. 
'It's trn« for you', says the wife, making answer to 
him ; ' bwt where will you get a master for him, or 
who'll tnl-e him for an apprentice in such a business ?' 
' I'll tell you that', says the husband to her again. * I'll 
send hire to Kerry. Sorrow better hand would you get 
at the business anywhere, than there are about the moun- 
tain there— and I'll be bound he'll come home to us a 



THE BOCI OF THE CANDLE. 847 

good hand at his business', says he. Well and good, they 
sent off the boy to Kerry, and bound him for seven years 
to a thief that was well-known in these parts, and counted 
a very clever man in his line. They heard no more of 
him for the seven years, nor hardly knew that they were 
out, when he walked into them one morning, with his 
' Save all here J' and took his seat at the table along with 
them — a fine, handsome lad, and mighty well spoken. 

* Well, Mun,' says the father, ' I hope you're master o* 
your business ?' ' Pretty well for that, father', says he ; 
' wait till we can have a trial of it'. ' With all my heart', 
says the father ; ' and I hope to see that you haven't been 
making a bad use o' your time while you were away !' 
Well, the news ran among the neighbours, what a fine able 
thief Mun had come home, and the landlord himself came 
to hear of it among the rest. So when the father went to 
his work the next morning, he made up to him, and— 
4 Well', says he, ' this is a queer thing I'm told about you, 
that you had your son bound to a thief in Kerry, and that 
he's come home to you a great hand at the business'. 

* Passable, indeed, he tells me, sir', says the father, quite 
proud in himself. ' Well, I'll tell you what it is', says the 
gentleman ; ' I have a fine horse in my stable, and I'll 
put a guard upon him to-night, and if yonr son be that 
great hand that he's reported to be, let him come and steal 
him out from among the people to night ; and if he does, 
he shall have my daughter in marriage, and my estate 
when I die,' says he. ' A great offer, surely*, says the 
poor man. ' But if he fails', says the gentleman, ' I'll 
prosecute him, and have him hanged, and you along with 
liim, for serving his time to a thief — a thing that's clearly 
again' all law', says he. Well, 'tis unknown what a 
whilliloo the father set up when he heard this. ' 
murther, sir,' says he, ' and sure 'tis well you know that 
if a spirit itself was there he couldn't steal the horse that 
would be guarded that way, let alone my poor boy', says 



348 THE ROCK OF THE CANDLE. 

he ; ' and how will it be with us, or what did we ever do 
to you, sir, that you'd hang us that way ?' * I have my 
own reasons for it', says the geutleman, ' and you'd better 
go home at once, and tell the boy about it, if you have a 
mind he should try his chance'. Well, the father went 
home crying and bawling, as if all belonging to him were 
dead. ' E', what ails you, father', says the son, ' or what 
is it makes you be bawling that way ?' says he. So he 
up and told him the whole business, how they were to be 
hanged, the two of them, in the morning, if he wouldn't 
have the racer stolen. ' That beats Ireland', says the 
son ; * to hang a man for not stealing a thing is droll, 
surely ; but make your mind easy, father, my master 
would think no more of doing that than he would of eating 
a boiled potato'. Well, the old man was in great spirits 
when he heard the boy talk so stout, although he wasn't 
without having his doubts upon the business for all that. 
The boy set to work when the evening drew on, and dressed 
himself like an old bucaugh* with a tattered frieze coat 
about him, and stockings without any soles to 'em, with an 
old caubean of a straw hat upon the side of his head, and 
the tin can under his arm. 'Tis what he had in the tin can, 
I tell you, was a good sup of spirits, with a little poppy 
juice squeezed into it to make them sleepy that would be 
after drinking it. Well and good, Minny, my child, he 
made towards the gentleman's house, and when he was 
passing the parlour window, he saw a beautiful young 
lady, as fair as a lily, and with a fine blush entirely, 
sitting and looking out about the country for herself. So 
he took off his hat, aud turned out his toes, and made her 
a low bow, quite elegant. ' I declare to my heart', says 
the young lady, speaking to her servant that stood behind 
her, ' 1 wouldn't desire to see a handsomer man than that. 
If he had a better shoot of clothes upon him, he'd be 
equal to any gentleman, he's so slim and delicate'. And 
* A lame man — idiomatically, beggar-man. 



THE ROCK OF THE CANDLE. 349 

who wag this bat the gentleman's daughter all the while! 
Well, 'tis well became Mun, he went on to the stable 
door, and there he found the lads all watching the racer. 
I'll tell you the way they watched her. They hnd one 
upon her back, and another at her head, where she was 
tied to the manger, and a great number of them about the 
place, sitting down between her and the door. ' Save 
all here!' says Mun, putting in his head at the door. 'E', 
what are ye doing here, boys ?' says he. So they up and 
told him they were guarding the racer from a great Kerry 
thief they expected to be stealing her that night. 'Why 
then he'll be a smart fellow, if he gets her out of that', 
says Mun, making as if he knew nothing. • I'd be for 
ever obliged to ye, if ye'd let me light a pipe and sit 
down awile with ye, and I'll do my part to make the 
company agreeable'. ' Why then,' says they, ' we have 
but poor treatment to offer you, for though there's plenty 
to eat here, we have nothing to drink — the master 
wouldn't allow us a hap'orth in dread we'd get sleepy, 
and let the horse go.' ' Oh ! the nourishment is all I 
want', says Mun, 'I'm no uay dry at all'. Well and 
good, in he came, and he sat among them telling stories 
until past midnight, eating and laughing ; and every now 
and then, when he'd stop in the story, he'd turn about 
and make as if he was taking a good drink out of the can. 
' You seem to be very fond of that tin can, whatever you 
have in it', says one of the men that was sitting near 
him. ' Oh, its no signify', says Mun, shutting it up as if 
not anxious to share it. Well they got the smell of it 
about the place, and 'tis little pleasure they took in the 
stories after, only every now and then throwing an eye at 
the can, and snuffing with their noses, like pointers when 
game is in the wind. ' Tisn't any spring water you'd 
have in that, I believe', says one of them. ' You're 
welcome to try it', says Mun, ' only I thought you might 
have some objection in regard of what you said when I 



S50 THE BOCK OF THE CANDLE. 

came in'. ' None in the world', says they. So he filled a 
few little noggins for 'em, and for the man on the horse 
and the man near the manger, and they all drank until 
they slept like troopers. When they were all fast, up got 
the youth, and he drew on a pair of worsted stockings 
over every one of the horse's legs, so they wouldn't make 
any noise, and he got a rope and fastened the man I tell 
you was upon the racer's back, by the shoulders, up to the 
rafters, when he drew the horse from under him, and 
left him hanging fast asleep. Well became him, he led 
the horse out of the stable, and had him home at his 
father's while a cat would be shaking his ears, and 
made up comfortably in a little out-house. ' Well', says 
the old man when he woke in the morning and saw the 
horse sto'en — ' if it was an angel was there', says he, ' he 
couh n'« do the business cleverer than that'. And the 
same thing he said to the landloid, when he met him in 
the field the same morning. ' It's true for you, indeed', 
said the gentleman, ' nothing could be better done, and 
I'll take it as an honour if your son and yourself will give 
me your company at dinner to-day, and I'll have the 
pleasure of introducing him to my daughter'. ' E', is it 
me dine at your honour's table ?' says the old man, looking 
down at his dress. "lis just', says the gentleman again, 
' and I'll take no apology whatever'. Well and good, 
they made themselves ready, the two of them, and young 
Mun came riding upon the racer, covered all over with 
the best of wearables, and looking like a real gentleman. 
'E', what's that there, my child ?' says the father, pointing 
to a gallows, that was plant; d right opposite the gentle- 
man's hall door. ' 1 don't know — a gallows, I'm think- 
ing', says the son, — ' sure 'tisn't to hang us he would be, 
after asking us to his house, unless it be a thing he means 
to give us our dinner first, and our dessert alter, as the 
fashion goes', says he. Will in with them, and they 
iound the company all waiting, a power of ladies and lords, 



THE ROCK CF THE CANDLE. $51 

end great people entirety. * I'm sorry to keep you 
waiting', says Mun, making up to them, quite free and 
easy, ' but the time stole upon us'. ' You couldn't blame 
the time for taking after yourself, says the gentleman. 
1 It's true, indeed', says Mun, ' 1 stole many is the thing 
in my time, but there's one thing I'd rather thieve than 
all the rest — the good will o' the ladies', says he, smiling, 
and looking round at them. ' Why, then, I wouldn't trust 
you very far with that either', says the young lady of the 
house. Well and good, they sat down, and they ate their 
dinner, and after the cloth was removed, there was a 
covered dish laid upon the table. ' Well', says the gen- 
tleman, ' I have one trial more to make of your wit — and 
I'll tell you what it is : — let me know what is it I have in 
this covered dish ; and if you don't, I'll hang you and your 
father upon that gallows over, for stealing my racer'. 
4 murther ! d'ye hear this ?' says the father, — ' and 
wasn't it your honour's bidding to steal her, or you'd hang 
us ? Sure we're to be pitied with your honour', says the 
poor old man. * Very well', says the gentleman, ' I tell 
you a fact, and your only chance is to answer my ques- 
tion'. * Well, sir', says Mun, giving all up for lost, ' I have 
nothing to say to you — although far the fox may go, he'll 
be caught by the tail at last'. • I declare you have it', 
says the gentleman, uncovering the dish, and what should 
be in it only a fox's tail ! Well, they gave it up to Mun, 
that he was the greatest rogue going, and the young lady 
married him upon the spot. They had the maste -'s estate 
when he died ; and if they didn't live happy, I wish that 
you and I may". 

" Amen to that, aunt. Will you lay the mirror aside 
for a moment. — Ha ! whose fault was that ?" 

"Oh, Minny, you have broken the mirror — 0, my 
child! my child!" 

" Why so ! It is not so valuable". 

** Valuable ! It is not the worth of the paitry glass, 



352 THE ROCK OF THE CANDLE. 

darling — but don't you know it is not good ? It is nol 
lucky — and the night before your bridal, too !" 

,k I am very sorry for it", said the girl, bending a some- 
what serious gaze on the shattered fragments of the antique 
looking-glass. Then, bv a transit ion which it would require 
some knowledge of the maiden's history to account for, she 
said, " I wonder if Cormac was with the Knight, when he 
made the sally at the castle, yesterday". 

The answer of the elderly lady was interrupted by the 
sound of several voices in an outer apartment exclaiming, 
" Cormac ! Cormac ! Welcome, Cormac ! It is Cormac !" 

" And it is Cormac !" echoed Minny, starting from her 
seat, and glancing at the spot where the mirror ought to 
have been. " You were right, aunt", she added, in a dis- 
appointed tone, as she bounded out of the room, " it was 
unlucky to break the mirror". 

" It might for them that would want it", replied the 
old lady, following at a lively pace ; " but for you, I hope 
it will bring nothing worse than the loss of it for this 
night''. 

She found Minny seated, with one hand clasped in 
those of a young soldier, dressed in the uniform of the 
White Knight, smiling and blushing with all the artlessness 
in the world. The young man wore a close fitting 
tiuis, which display ed a handsome form to the best advan- 
tage, and contrasted well with the loose and flowing dra- 
pery of his mantle. The birrede of green cloth, which had 
confined his hair, was laid aside ; aud a leathern girdle 
appeared at his waist, which held a bright skene and 
pistol. The appearance of both figures, the expression of 
Woth coun'ennuces, secure of present, and confident of 
future happiness, formed a picture 

Which some would smile, and more perhaps would 8igh at; 

a picture which would bring back pleasing recollections 
tuough to sweeten the temper of the sourest pair that 



THE ROCK OF THE CANDLE. 853 

Hymen ever disunited, and to move the spleen of the best 
natured old bachelor that ever dedicated his hearth to 
Dian and solitude. 

The evening proceeded as the eve of a bridal might be 
supposed to do, with its proportion of mirth and mischief. 
The lovers had been acquainted from childhood ; and every 
one who knew them felt an interest in their fortunes, and 
a share in the happiness which they enjoyed. The sun 
had been already long gone down, when Minny, in com- 
pliance with the wish of her old aunt, sang the following 
words to an air, which was only remarkable for its sim- 
plicity and tenderness :— 

t. 

I love my love in the morning, 

For she, like morn, is fair ■ 
Her blushing cheek, its crimson 9treak; 

Its clouds, her golden hair; 
Her glance, its beam, so soft an<? kind ; 

Her tears, its dewy showers' 
And her voice, the tender whispering wind 

That stirs the early bowers 



I love my love in the morning 

I love my love at noon ; 
For she is bright as the lord o\ ^ht, 

Yet mild as autumn's moon. 
Her beauty is my bosom's sun, 

Her faith my fostering shade; 
And I will love my darling one 

Till even sun shall fade. 



I love my love in the morning, 

I love my love at even ; 
Her smile's soft play is like the ray 

That lights the western Heaven. 
I loved her when the sun was high, 

1 loved her when he rose, 
Bat best of all, when evening*! lifto 

Was murmuring at its close. 



054 THE ROCK OF THE CANDLE. 

The song was scarcely ended, when Minny felt her arm 
grasped with an unusual force by the young soldier. 
Turning round, in some alarm, she beheld a sight which 
filled her with fear and anxiety. Her lover sat erect in 
his cliair, gazing fixedly on the open casement, through 
which a strong and whitish light shone full upon his face 
and person. It was an interlunar night, and Minny felt 
at a loss to conjecture what the cause could be of this ex- 
traordinary appearance. 

" Minny", said her lover, " look yonder ! I see a 
Ciiidle burning on the very summit of the rock above us! 
Although the wind is bending every tree upon the hill- 
side, the flame does not flicker or change in the slightest 
degree. Look on it!" 

" Do not look !" exclaimed the old aunt, with a shrill 
cry. " May Heaven be about us ! Do not glance at the 
window. It is the death light !" 

Minny clasped her hands, and sank back into her chair. 

*' Let some one close the window", said the young 
soldier, speaking in a faint tone. " I am growing ill; let 
some one close the window". 

The old M'oman advanced cautiously towards the case- 
ment, and extending the handle of a broom stick at 
the utmost stretch of her arm, was endeavouring to push 
the shutter to, when Minny, recovering from her astonish- 
ment, darted at her an indignant look, ran to the window, 
closed it, and left the room in darkness deeper than that 
of night. 

" What was that strange light V asked the young sol- 
dier, looking somewhat relieved. 

With some hes : tation, and a few prophetic groans and 
oscillations of the head, the old story-teller informed him 
that it was a light, whose appearance was commemorial 
with the rock itself, and that it usually foreboded consider- 
able danger 01 misfortune, if not death, to any unhappy 
being on whom its beams might chance to fail. It ap- 



THE BOCK OF THE CANDLE. 355 

peared, Indeed, but rarely ; yet, there never was instance 
known in which the indication proved fallacious. 

The soldier recovered heart to laugh away the anxiety 
which had begun to creep upon the company ; and, in a 
little time, the mirthful tone of the assemblage was fully 
restored. Lights of a more terrestrial description than 
that which figured on the haunted rock, were introduced ; 
songs were sung ; jests echoed from lip to lip ; and merry 
feet pattered against the earthen floor, to the air of the 
national rinceadh fadha. The merriment of the little party 
was at its highest point, when a galloping of horses, inter- 
mingled with a distant rolling of musketry, was heard 
outside the cottage. 

" My fears were just !" exclaimed Cormac, stopping 
short in the dance, while he still retained the hand of his 
lovely partner : " the English have taken the castle, and 
the White Knight is flying for his life !" 

His surmise was confirmed by the occurrence which in- 
stantly followed. The door was dashed back upon its 
hinges, and the White Knight, accompanied by two of his 
retainers, rushed into the house. The chiei'tain's face was 
pale and anxious, and his dress was bespattered with 
blood and mire. Three figures remained in a group near 
the door, as if listening for the sounds of pursuit ; while 
the revellers hurried together like startled fawns, and 
gazed, with countenances indicative of strong interest or 
wild alarm, upon the baffled warriors. 

" Cormac 1" cried the Knight, perceiving the bridegroom 
among the company, " my good fellow, I missed you in 
an unlucky hour. These English dogs have worried us 
from our hold, and are stiil hot upon our scent. I have 
only time to bid my stout soldiers farewell, and go to 
meet them, for I will not have this happy floor stained 
with blood to-night". 

"That shall not be, Knight", exclaimed the bride- 



356 THE ROCK OF THE CANDLE. 

gjroom ; " we will meet themj or fiy together. You were 
ny father's foster-child". 

" It is in vain — look there !" He laid bare his left arm, 
vhich was severely gashed on one side. — '• They have had 
i taste of me already, and the bloodhounds will never tire 
till they have tracked me home. And yet, if I had only 
one day's space — Kavanagh and his followers are at 
Kilmallock, and the castle might be mine again before the 
moon rises to-morrow evening". 

" Kavanagh at Kilmallock !" exclaimed Cormac. " 
my chieftain ! what do you do here ? Fly, while you have 
rime, and leave us to deal with the foe". 

" It were idle", repeated the Knight, " their horses are 
"resher than ours, and my dress would betray me". 

" My mare will bear you safe", cried the young soldier, 
■vith a burst of enthusiasm ; " and for your dress, take 
mine, and let me play the White Knight for once" 

The chieftain's eyes brightened at the word, and a 
hope seemed to bloom out upon his cheek, — but a low 
;ound of suppressed agony from the bride checked it in 
che spring. 

" No, Cormac", he said, " I will not be your murderer". 

" There is no fear", said Cormac, warmly, " you will 
be back in time to prevent mischief; and if you remain, 
it will be only to see me share your fate. This is my only 
chance for life ; for I will give the world leave to cry shame 
upon my head, if ever I outlive my master". 

" What says the bride ?" inquired the Knight, bending 
on her a look of mingled pity and admiration. 

"I will answer for her", said Cormac; "she had rather 
be the widow of a true Irishman, than the wife of a fated 
one' . 

" allilu ? we'll all be murthered if you don't hurry", 
said the aunt. " What do you say, Minny, my child ?" 

** Cormac speaks the truth", replied the trembling girl, 



THE ROCK OF THE CANDLE. 857 

hanging in her weakness on his shoulder; "if there be 
no other way, I am content it should be so". 

She was rewarded for this effort of heroism by a 
fervent pressure of the hand from her betrothed, and the 
exchange of accoutrements was presently effected. The 
Knight mounted Comae's mare, and prepared to depart. 

" My gallant fellow", he said, holding out his hand to 
the generous bridegroom, " you do not mock the part you 
act, for nobility is stamped upon your soul. If you suffer 
for this, I have a vow, that I will never more wear any 
other garb than yours ; for you are the knightlier of the 
two. Let me clasp your hand, than which a nobler 
never closed on gauntlet". 

They joined hands in silence, and the chieftain galloped 
away with his retainers. When they were out of hearing, 
Cormac turned to his bride, and again pressing her hand, 
while he looked fixedly into her eyes, he said: "Now, 
Minny, you will show that you are fit for a soldier's wife. 
Go. with your aunt Norry, into your room. No one here 
will be molested but those who are in arms for the 
Knight ; and I will contrive to postpone any violence, for 
a day, at least". 

" 1 will not leave you, Cormac", said Minny, speaking 
more firmly than she had done since the interruption of 
the festivity. " I am somewhat more to you than you are 
to the White Knight". 

Cormac smiled, and seemed to acquiesce for some time 
in her wishes. He tcok his seat at the hearth with the 
bespattered garb and sullied weapon of the knight, and 
awaited in silence the approach of the pursuers, while 
Minny occupied a chair as near him as might be decorous, 
taking his new rank into consideration. They listened for 
a considerable time to the changeful rushing of the night 
wind among the trees that clothed the hill-side, and the 
howling of the wolves, that were disturbed in their retreats 
bv the sounds of comb-t. Those sounds, renewed after 



858 THE ROCK OF THE CANDLE. 

long intervals and in an irregular manner, gradually ap« 
proached more near, and they could plainly distinguish the 
trampling of horses' feet over the beaten track that 
winded among the crags as far as the cottage door. 
Again, and with great eagerness, Cormac entreated his 
love to secure herself from the chances of their first en- 
counter, by joining the family in the inner room ; but she 
refused in a resolute tone, and on persisting, she assumed 
an impatience, and even a desperation of manner, which 
showed that her purpose was not to be shaken. 

" Ask me not to leave you", she said ; " any other 
command I am ready to obey. I will be silent ; I will 
not shriek, nor murmur, even though " She shud- 
dered, and let her head droop upon his hand. " I will 
not leave you, Cormac. Whatever your fate shall be, I 
must remain to witness it. Do not doubt my firmness ; 
only say that you will freely trust me, and 1 am ready for 
the worst that can happen. I feel that I can be calm, if 
you will only give me your confidence". 

There are some spirits which, like the myrtle, require to 
be bruised and broken by affliction, before their sweetness 
can be discovered. The young bride of Cormac might 
now have exhibited an instance of this moral truth. So 
perfectly did her manner indicate the degree of self-posses- 
sion which she promised to maintain, that Cormac yielded 
without further argument to her entreaty, and resumed his 
place at the fireside. 

Scarcely had he performed this movement when a Iond 
knocking was agaiu heard at the door ; and immediately 
after, as if this slight ceremony were only used in mockery, 
the frail barrier was once more dashed inward on its 
hinges. A crowd of soldiers rushed into the apartment, 
and stopped short on seeing the bridegroom habited in the 
accoutrements of the White Knight, and standing in a 
posture of defence between his foes and the young girl, 
who seemed to be restrained, rather by her deference to 



THE BOCK OF THE CANDLE. 359 

bis wishes, than by any personal apprehension, from pres- 
sing forward to his side. 

" Stand back !" said Cormac, levelling his blade at the 
foremost of the throng. " Before you advance further, 
say what it is you seek. The inmates of this house (all 
but one) are under the protection of the English law, and 
can only be molested at your great peril". 

" If you be the White Knight, as your dress bespeaks 
you", returned an English officer, " surrender your sword 
and person into our hands. It is only him we seek, and 
no one else shall be disturbed, further than to answer our 
claim of bonaght bor — rest and refreshment for our small 
troop until the morning breaks". 

" I am not so thirsty of blood for the sake of shedding 
it merely", returned the pseudo knight, " that I would 
destroy a life of Heaven's bestowing in a vain encounter. 
Here is my sword, although I am well aware that in yield- 
ing it without a struggle, I do not add a single one to my 
chances (if any I had) of safety in the hands of my Lord 
President". 

" It would be dishonourable in me to deceive you", said 
the Englishman : " your ready, though late, surrender can 
avail you little. I have here the warrant, which com- 
mands that the execution of the rebel captain should not 
be deferred longer than six hours after his arrest. I am 
not disposed, however, to be more rigid than my instruc- 
tions compel me to be, so that you may call the whole six 
hours your own, if you can find use for so much time in 
this world". 

Cormac turned pale, and thought of Minny ; but he 
dared not look at her. The poor girl endeavoured to sup- 
port herself against the chair which her lover hac' left 
vacant, and retired a little, lest he should observe and par- 
ticipate in the agitation which this fatal announcement had 
occasioned. 

" I thought it probable", said Cormac, with some hesita 



360 TUB BOCK OF THE CANDLE. 

tion, " that I might have hr.d a day, at all events, to pre* 
pare for my fate ; but my Lord President is a pious man, 
and must be better aware than I, how much time a sinner 
under arms might require to collect his evidence for that 
last and fearful court-martial, whose decision is irrevo- 
cable. A soldier's conscience, sir officer, is too often the 
only thing about him which he allows to gather rust. If 
1 had been careful to preserve that as unsullied as my 
sword, I would not esteem your six hours so short a space 
as they now appear". 

" The gift of grace, sir knight", said a solemn-looking 
sergeant, " is not like an Earthly plant, which requires 
much time and toil to bring its blossom forth. Heard ye 
not of the graceless traveller, who, riding somewhat more 
than a Sabbath-d.y's journey on the seventh, was thrown 
from his horse and kilied near a place of worship ? The 
congregation thought his doou. was sealed for both worlds, 
and yet, 

Between the stirrup and the ground, 
Mercy he sought and mercy h« found" 

" Aye", said the captive ; " there are some persona 
who look on this world as mere billeting quarters, and 
require no more time to prepare for the eternal route than 
they might to brace up a havresac ; but my memory is not 
so ligiu of carriage. 1 remember to have heard at Mung- 
harid, a Latin adage, which might shake the courage of 
any one who was incliued to rely venturously on his 
powers of spiritual dispatch : — 

Unus erat — ne desperes : 
Unus taut mil — ne presumas. 

However, T shall be as far wide of the first peril as I 
should w ish to be of the last. Come, sirs, you forg. t your 
supper ; leave me to my own thoughts, and pray respect 
this maiden, who will attend to your wants while I rest". 
" She seems as if she would more willingly omit that 



THE ROCK OF THE CANDLE. 

office", said the Englishman. " The maiden 
for your misfortune, Knight". 

" Poor girl !" Cormac exclaimed, venturing to loot 
round upon her for the first time since his capture. " It 
is little wonder that she should wear a troubled brow. 
You have disturbed her bridal feast". Then taking her 
hand, aud pressing it significantly while he spoke, he 
added : " Your husband was reckoned a true man, and I 
know him well enough to be convinced that he would not 
place his heart in the keeping of an unworthy or a selfish 
love. I know, therefore, that yon could not make him 
happier than by acting on this occasion with that firmness 
which he expects from you. Tell him, I knew better the 
value of life than to lament my fate, at least for my own 
sake : and remember, likewise, Minny (is not that your 
name ?) if ever Cormac should, like me, be hurried off by 
an untimely stroke of fate — if ever" — he renewed the 
pressure of the hand, which he still held in his — " if ever 
you should see hiin led, as I must now be, to an early 
death, remember, my girl, that none but the craven- 
hearted are short-lived on Earth. A brave man, who had 
fulfilled all his duties, can never die untimely ; but a 
coward would, though every hair were gray upon his 
brow". 

He strove to withdraw his hand ; but Minny, who felt 
as if he were tearing her heart away from her, held it fast 
between both hers, and pressed it with the grasp of a 
drowning person. Cormac felt, by the trembling and 
moistness of her hand, that she was on the point of 
placing all in danger by bursting into a passion of grief. 
He lowered his voice to a tone of grave reproof, and said : 

" Remember, Minny, let him not find that he has been 
deceived in you. That would be a worse stroke than the 
headsman's". 

The forlorn girl collected all her strength, and felt the 
tumult that was rising in her breast subside, like the 
16 



862 THE BOCK OF THE CANDLE. 

uproar of the northern tempest, at the voice of the Reira 
kennar. She let his hand go, and stood erect, while he 
passed on, followed by several of the party, into another 
room. Strange as sorrow had ever been to her bosom, 
she could not have anticipated, and was wholly incapable 
of supporting the dreadful desolation of spirit which came 
upon her after she was left alone. She remained for s»*ne 
time motionless, in the attitude of one who listens intehcly, 
until she heard the door of a small inner apartment, into 
which he had been conducted, close upon her lover ; and 
then gathering her hands across her bosom, and walking 
slowly to the vacant chair, she sank down in a violent and 
hysterical excess of grief. 

It is strange that the effusion of a few drops of ; b' <<y 
liquid at the eyes, should enable the sonl to give mo e 
tranquil entertainment to a painful thought or feeling ; 
but it is a fact, however, which Minny experienced in 
common with all who have known what painful feeliugs 
are. She pictured to herself the probable nature of the 
fate which awaited her betrothed; and from the horror 
which she felt in the contemplation, proceeded to devise 
expedients for its prevention. This, however, appeared 
now to be a hopeless undertaking. The warrant of the 
Lord President must needs be executed within the time ; 
and it was improbable that the White Knight could re- 
turn before the expiration of the six hours. Would it be 
possible to contrive a schemo for his liberation ? Hia 
guards were vigilant and numerous, and there was but 
one way by which he could return from the room, and 
that was occupied by sentinels. If Mun, or the Kerry 
thief, his master, were on the spot, of what a load might 
they relieve her heart ! She would have given worlds to 
be mistress, for one night, of the roguery of the adept in 
aunt Norry's tale. 

We shall leave her for the present, involved, like a 
bungling dramatiat, in a labyiinth of ravelled plots and 



THE BOCK OF THE CANDLE. 863 

contrivances, while we shift the scene to the unfortunate 
hero of the night, who lay in his room, expecting the ca- 
tastrophe with no very enviable sensations. 

The soldiers had left him to make the necessary pre- 
parations for his approaching fate in darkness and solitude. 
He was now on the point of achieving a character, not 
without precedent in the history of his country — namely, 
that of a martyr to his own heroic fidelity — and he was 
determined to bear his part like a warrior to the last. 
Still, however, to a lover, conscious of being loved again — 
to a young man, with prospects so fail - and present happi- 
ness so nearly perfect — to a bridegroom, snatched from 
the altar to the scaffold, at the very moment when he was 
about to become doubly bound to life by a tie so holy and 
so dear — to such an one, though brave as a fiery heart and 
youthful blood could make him, it was impossible that 
death should not wear a grim and most unwelcome aspect. 
Neither is the man to be envied, whose nature could 
undergo so direful a change without emotion. True 
bravery consists, not in ignorance of, or insensibility to 
danger, but in the resolution which can meet and defy it, 
when duty renders such collision necessary. Fear, in 
common with all the other passions of our nature, has 
been given us for the purpose of exercisiug our reason, 
and acquiring a virtue by its subjugation ; and the man (if 
any such ever lived) who is ignorant of the feeling, is a 
monster, and not a hero. The truly courageous man is 
he who has a heart to feel what danger is, and a soul to 
triumph over that feeling, when it would tempt him to the 
neglect of any moral or religious obligation. Such was 
the temper of Cormac. He believed that he was per 
forming his duty, and did not even entertain a thought of 
any other Hue of conduct than that which be was pur- 
suing; but this did not prevent his being deeply and 
bitterly conscious of the hardness of his fortunes, in this 
unlooked-for and untimely separation. 



364 THE ROCK OF THE CANDLE. 

Exhausted by the intensity of his sensations, he had 
dropped for some time into a troubled and uneasy slumber, 
when the pressure of a soft hand upon his brow made him 
lift up his eyes, and raise himself upon his elbow. He 
beheld Minny stooping over him, with a dim rushlight 
burning in one hand, while with the other she motioned 
him to express no surprise, and to preserve silence. 

" Hush, hush !" she said, in a low whisper, " Cormac, 
are you willing to make an effort for liberty ?" 

He stared strangely upon her, and stood on his feet. 
" What is the meaning of this, Minny ; how came you 
here?" 

*' The soldiers have been merrier than they intended, 
and I drugged their drink for them. Slip off your brogs, 
and steal out in your truis only. They are now sleeping 
in the next room, and I have left them in the dark. Fear 
not their muskets ; I have drenched the matchlocks for 
them. There are only two waking, who are on guard out- 
side the door ; and for these, we must even place our hopes 
in Heaven, and take the chance of their bad marksmanship. 
Ah, Cormac! — but there is no time to lose; come with me". 
" My glorious heroine !" cried the astonished soldier, " I 
could not have thought this possible". 
" Hush ! your raptures will betray us". 
" But whither do you intend to fly ?" 
" To the cavern on the western side of the hill, where 
Fitzgerald lay on the night of the great massacre at A dare 
Castle. Keep close to me, and I think it likely we shall 
pass the sleepers". 

She extinguished the light ; ano both crept, with 
noiseless footsteps, into the adjoining room, which was the 
chamber of the heroic maiden herself. As they en- 
deavoured to steal between the soldiers, who lay locked in 
dumber on the ground, Minny set her foot on some brittle 
.substance, which cracked beneath her weight with a noise 
auttieiout to awaken one of the soldiers. 



THE ROCK OP THE C AND LI. 365 

" It is the mirror !" said Minny to herself; "my aunt 
Norry's prophecy was but too correct, and my vanity has 
ruined everything". 

Still, however, her presence of mind did not forsake 
her. The soldier, turning suddenly round, laid hold of 
Cormac's estaigh or mantle, and arrested his progress. 

" Ho ! ho !" he exclaimed, " who have we here ?" 

" Prithee, let go my dress, master soldier", returned 
the young girl ; " this freedom tallies not well with your 
sermon on grace to the White Knight. I doubt you for a 
eoleinn hypocrite". 

" I knew you not, wench", replied the sergeant, letting 
Cormac's mantle fall, " or I would as soon have thought 
of clapping palms with Beelzebub, as of fingering any part 
of your Irish trumpery. Whither do ye travel at this 
time of the night ?" 

" Even to kindle my rushlight at our hearth-stone in 
the next room. Turn on your pallet, sergeant, and let 
me go, else you may be troubled with unholy dreams". 

They passed on, and reached the outer room in safety. 

" Now, Minny", said Cormac, " it is my turn to make 
a suggestion. Do you pass out, and await me at the 
stream that runs by the edge of the wood. The sentinels 
will suffer you to proceed, and the risk of detection will 
be lessened. Nay, never stop to dispute the point : its 
advantages are unquestionable". 

Minny would not even trust her3elf with a farewell 
before she obeyed the wishes of her lover. A few passing 
jests were all she had to encounter from the sentinels, and 
Cormac had the satisfaction to see her hurry on, unmo- 
lested, in the direction of the stream. When he supposed 
a sufficient time had elapsed to enable her to reach the 
place of rendezvous, he threw aside Lis mantle, and pre- 
pared to take the sentinels by surprise. The door stood 
open, and he could plainly see the two guards pacing to 
and fro in the moonlight. Pausing for a moment, he up- 



366 THE ROCK OF THE CANDLE. 

lifted his clasped hands to Heaven, and breathed a short 
and agitated prayer of mingled hope and resignation. 
Then summoning the resolution which never failed him in 
his need, he darted through the doorway iuio the open 
air. 

Astonishment and perplexity kept the sentinels motion- 
less for some moments, and Cormac had fled a considerable 
distance before they became sensible of the nature of the 
occurrence which had taken place. Both instantly dis- 
charged their pieces in the direction of the fugitive, and 
tvith loud shouts summoned their comrades to assist in 
the pursuit. The bullets tore up the earth on either side 
of Cormac, who could hear, as he hurried on, the execra- 
tions and uproar of the awakened troop at finding their 
arms rendered incapable of service. He dashed onward 
toward the wood, and had the happiness, while the sounds 
of pursuit yet lingered far behind, to discern the white 
dress of his betrothed fluttering in distinct relief against 
the dark and shadowy foliage of the elm wood. Snatch- 
ing her up in his arms with as little difficulty as a mother 
feels in supporting her infant, he hurried across the stream, 
and was quickly buried in the recesses of the wood. 

The morning broke before they had reached the ap- 
pointed place of concealment. It was one of those 
ancient receptacles for the noble dead, which were hol- 
lowed out of the earth in various parts of the country, 
and were frequently used during the persecutions of 
foreign invaders, as places of refuge and concealment for 
the persons and properties of the people. When they 
found themselves safely sheltered within the bosom of this 
close retreat, the customary effect of long restrained 
anxiety and sudden joy was produced upon the lovers. 
They flung themselves, with broken exclamations of de- 
light and affection, into each other's arms, and remained 
for a considerable time incapable cf acting or speaking 
irith any degree of self-possession. The necessity, how* 



THE ROCK OF TEE CANDLE. 367 

ever, of providing for their safety during the ensuing lay, 
recalled them to a more distinct perception of the difficulties 
of their situation, and suggested expedients for their alle- 
viation or removal. 

They ventured not beyond the precincts of their Drui- 
dical sojourn until the approach of evening, and even 
then it was but to look upon the sunlight, and hurry back 
again to their lurking-place in greater anxiety than before. 
The English had discovered, and were fast approaching 
the mouth of their retreat. 

Cormac, signifying to his bride that she should remain 
silent in the interior of the cave, drew his sword and 
stood near the entrance, just as the light became obscured 
by the persons of the party who were to enter. They 
paused for some time on hearing the voice of Cormac, who 
threatened to sacrifice the first person that should venture 
to place his foot inside the mouth of the recess. In a few 
moments after, the devoted pair were perplexed to hear 
the sound of stones and earth thrown together, as if to 
erect some building near the cave. Unable to form any 
conjecture as to the nature and object of this proceeding, 
they clung together, in silence and increased anxiety, 
awaiting the issue. 

On a sudden, a strong whitish light streamed into the 
cavern, casting the dark and lengthened shadows of the 
party who stood without, m sharp distinctness of outline 
upon the broken rocks on the opposite. 

" Look there, Minny !" exclaimed the youth, " it is the 
moon-rise, and we may shortly look for the return of our 
chief". 

" It cannot be, Cormac. The shadows would fall, it 
that case, to the westwards, and not to the south. It is a 
more fatal signal, it is the death light of the Rock !" 

Cormac paused for some moments. "Fatal it may 
be *', he replied, — " but do you observe, Minny, that no 
part of its ghastly lustre has fallen upon us ? It is shining 



568 THE UOCK OF THK CANDT.1C 

bright upon oar enemies. There id a promise in that, if 
there be in reality any supernatural meaning in the 
appearance". 

Minny sighed anxiously, while she hnng upon his arm 
— but made no answer to this cheering suggestion. The 
party outside continued then' labour, and in a little time 
the light was only discernible, as if penetrating through 
small crevices at the entrance. 

" What can they intend ?" said Minny, after a pause of 
some minutes, during which the party outside maintained 
profound silence. " All merciful Heaven '" she continued, 
starting to her feet in renewed alarm, — " we are about to 
suffer the fate of Desmond's Kernes — they are going to 
suffocate us with fire !" 

A dense volume of smoke, which rolled into the cavern 
through the crevices before-mentioned, confirmed this 
terrific conjecture. The practice, all barbarous as it was, 
had been frequently resorted to by the conquering party 
in the subjugation of the inland districts of the island. 
Feeble as he bad been rendered by fatigue, anxiety, and 
want of food, Cormac resolved to make a desperate effort 
to escape the horrible death which menaced them, and 
rushed, sword in hand, to the mouth of the cave. But he 
was met by a mass of heated vapour, which deprived him 
of the power of proceeding, or even calling aloud to their 
destroyers. He tottered back to where he had left his 
bride, and sinking down on the earth beside her, felt a 
horrid sense of despair weigh down his energies likt 
cowardice. Again he arose, and attempted to force bit- 
way through the entrance, and again he was compelled to 
relinquish the effort. He cried aloud to them — offered to 
surrender — and entreated that they would at least have 
mercy on his companion. But no answer was returned. 
and the dreadful conclusion remained to be deduced, that, 
contented with having made the work of death secure, they 
had retired to a distance from the place. 



THE ROCK OF THE CANDLE. 369 

With a sickening heart, eyes swollen and painful, and a 
reeling brain, Cormac once more resumed his place by the 
side of his betrothed. She had fallen into a kind of 
delirium, and extended her arms towards him with an ex- 
pression of suffering, which made his keart ache more 
keenly than his own agonies. 

" I want air, Cormac ! — oh, Cormac, my love ! take me 
home with you — take me into the green fields — for I am 
dying here. — Air, Cormac ! air, for the love of Heaven !" 

" My own love, you shall have it — look up, and bear 
a good heart for two minutes, and we shall all be happy 
again". 

" This place is horrible — it is like Hell ! It is Hell ! 
Are we living yet ? I have been a sinner ; and yet, T 
hoped, too, Cormac — I always hoped" — 

" Hope yet, Minny, and you shall not hope in vain — ■ 
keep your face near the earth, where the air is freest. 
Ha ! listen to that. The White Knight is returned, and 
we are safe !" 

A rolling of musketry, succeeded by yells, shouts, and 
cries of triumph and of anguish, was heard outside the 
cavern. Cormac and his bride stood erect once more ; but 
poor Minny's strength failed her in the effort, and she sank 
lifeless into the arms of her lover. In a few moments the 
mouth of the cavern was cleared ; and a flood of the cool 
sweet air rushed like a welcome to life and happiness, into 
the bosoms of the sufferers. Recovering new vigour with 
his draught, Cormac staggered toward the entrance, and 
massed out into the open air, with his fainting bride on his 
shoulder and a drawn sword in his right hand — pre- 
senting to the troop of liberators, who were gathered 
outside, a picture not unlike that of Theseus bearing the 
beautiful queen of Dis from the descent of Avernus. His 
pale cheeks looking paler in the moonlight, his wild 
Btaring eyes, scattered hair, and military attire, contributed 
to render the resemblance still more striking. 



370 THE ROCS OF THE CANDLE. 

The White Knight received him with open arms ; hut 
Cormac would hold no more lengthened communication 
until his bride was restored to health and consciousness. 

In this no great difficulty was encountered; aud tradition 
says, that the White Knight was one of the merriest 
dancers at the bridal feast, which was given at the cottage 
in a few days after these occurrences. 

I learned from a person curious in old legends, an 
account of the manner in which the "Candle on the Rock" 
was exorcised, — for it has not been seen for a long lapse 
of time. About two years after the marriage of Cormac 
and Minny, they were both seated, on a calm winter 
evening, in the room which had been the scene of so much 
tumult and disaster on the occasion above-mentioned. 
Minny was occupied in instructing a little rosy child 
(whose property it was, my fair readers may perhaps con- 
jecture) in the rudiments of locomotion ; while Cormac — 
(young husoands will play the fool sometimes) — held out 
his arms to receive the daring adventurer, after his 
hazardous journey of no less than two yards, on foot, 
across the floor. The tyro-pedestrian had executed about 
half his undertaking without meeting with any accident 
worthy of commemoration, and lo! aunt Norry was 
bending over him, with a smile and a " Ma gra hut" of 
overflowing affection, when an aged man presented himself 
at the open door, and solicited charity for the love of 
Heaven ! 

Minny placed a small cake of griddle bread in the arms 
of the infant, and bade him take it to the stranger. The 
child tottered across the floor with his burden, and 
deposited it in the bat of the poor pilgrim, who laid his 
withered hand on the glossy ringlets of the little innocent, 
and blessed him with much fervency. At that moment, 
the fatal Light of the Rock streamed through the doorway, 
and bathed in its lustre the persons of the wayfarer and 
his guileless entertainer. The poor mother shrieked aloud, 



THE BOCK OF THE CANDLE, 371 

and was about to rush towards the child, when the 
pilgrim, assuming on a sudden a lofty and maje3tia 
attitude, bade her remain where she stood, and suffer him 
to protect the child. 

" I know," said he, " the cause of your fear, and I hope 
to end it. The evil spirit who possesses that fatal signal, 
is as much under the control of the Almighty as the 
feeblest mortal amongst us ; and if there be on Earth a 
being who is exempt from the pernicious influence which 
the demon is permitted to exercise, surely the fiend may, 
with utmost security, be defied by innocence and charity". 

Having thus said, he knelt down, with the child 
between him and the Hock, and commenced a silent prayer, 
while his clasped hands rested on the head of the infant, 
his long gray hair hung down upon his shoulders, and hig 
clear blue eye was fixed upon the fatal Candle. As he 
prayed, the anxious parents observed the light grow 
fainter and fainter, and the shadows of the old man and 
child become less and less distinct, until at length the 
sallow hue of the pilgrim's countenance could scarcely be 
distinguished from the bloom that glowed upon the fresh 
cheeks of the infant. Before his prayer was ended, the 
light had disappeared altogether, and the child came 
running into the arms of its enraptured mother. When 
the first burst of joy had been indulged in, she looked up 
to thank the stranger ; but he was nowhere to be seen .' 

The death-light has never since reappeared upon the 
Rock, although it preserves the name which it received 
from that phantom. Cormac and Minny long continued 
to exercise the virtue of hospitality to which they owed so 
much in this instance ; and I am told that the child 
became a bishop in the course of time. This, surely, is 
good fortune enough to enable one to wind up a long story 
with credit ; and I have only to conclude, after aunt 
Norry's favourite form, by wishing : if they didn't livi 

HAPPY, THAT YOU AND I MAY. 



CONCLUSION. 



Br the time this last tale had drawn to its catastrophe, ' 
the narrator (the toothless hag before alluded to) found 
that she had been for a considerable time the sole admirer 
of her own romance. Alarmed by the increasing strength 
and harmony of the chorus with which the sleepers bore 
burden to her tale, she raised her palsied head from 
beneath the covering she had drawn over it, and gazed 
upon the circle. The host and hostess sat npright in their 
lofty chairs, snoring as if it had been for a wager, at tha 
same time that they maintained their attitudes with an un- 
bending dignity that would have struck Cineas mute ; 
while their friends lay scattered about the room in all di- 
rections, and some in very queer, comical postures indeed. 
As it was the tale, beyond all question, which had set 
them to sleep, so the sessation of the drowsy hum of the 
old woman's voice produced the contrary effect. The 
moment that perfect silence reigned around them, all 
rubbed their eyes, and awoke. The first gray shimmer of 
a winter dawn stole in upon the revellers — the fowls begau 
to ruflle their feathers upon the roost over the door — and 
the swinish citizms of a neighbouring piggery gave 
grunting salutation to the morn. 

With hurried and wondering gestures, the guests en- 
tered upon the bustle of separation, and the coast waa 
presently left clear of all but the good folks of the house- 
and their guest, the chronicler of the evening. 



CONCLUSION. 

Of late years, scenes like this have become rare 
Ireland. Before the period of the year arrives when 
ancient and revered custom reminds the peasant of the 
domestic jollities of his fathers and of his own childhood, 
the horn of the Whiteboy, or the yell of the more 
ferocious Rockite, has startled the keepers of the land, and 
warned the inhabitants to prepare for "other than dancing 
measures." Without presuming for an instant to venture 
an opinion on the causes of the change, we may, at 
least, calculate on the reader's sympathy in expressing a 
hope that it may be of brief continuance, and that the 
time may not be very distant, when the Irish agriculturist 
may enjoy the domestic comforts which at many periods 
were known to his progenitors, and which are not denied 
to other nations in our own day — when 

" every man shall eat in safety, 
Under his own hedge, what he plants, and sing 
The merry songs of peace to all his neighbours ;" 

when he can have his pit of potatoes, his reek of turf, his 
Sunday coat and brogues, his " three tinpennies" for tht 
priest at Christmas and Easter ; and his family fireside, 
and bis collection of " popular tales" at " Hollaud-tide.* 



m ikd 



SKETCHES 



ILLUSTRATIVE 



OF 



LIFE AND MANNERS 



IN THE 



SOUTH OF IRELAND. 



IRISH SATIRE. 



Among the many translated specimens with which we 
have been furnished from the remains of Old Irish Lite- 
rature in all its other branches, I do not recollect hav- 
ing seen any that told us of the existence of a satirical 
power. That this was rather the result of imperfect 
inquiry on the part of the curious in these matters, 
than of its actual non-existence, I always suspected — 
for satire is ever keenest when it is naive — and this last 
is the characteristic of unreclaimed genius, in all coun- 
tries. I have been enabled to procure some instances 
which are current amongst the peasantry of the South 
of Ireland, in their vernacular tongue ; and I shall 
venture to subjoin a few, almost literally rendered into 
English. They are presented under the form of fables, 
and like all early attempts of this nature, have the 
fault of being personal. The first is directed against 
one of those half gentry who supply the place of the 
absentee landlords, (this, it appears, was rather an 
ancient grievance,) and let out portions of land, in 
acres, half acres, and quarter acres, to the labourer 
who wishes to secure himself a store of potatoes 
against the idle season ensuing — and who take especial 



378 IRISH SATIKE. 

,are that they do not leave the premises until all 
demands have been cleared off by the miserable lessee. 
I remember having heard the table introduced with 
great effect, into a harangue, by an orator of this 
class. 

"John Finnane walked through his grounds — John 
was weary, and he sat down upon a ridge of potatoes. 
It was Jerry Graham's quarter. How astonished was 
John Finnane to hear Jerry's white-eyes talking to one 
another in the ground under him : He stooped, and 
began to listen. ' Will you grow any more ?' says a 
little potatoe to a big potatoe. ' No,' says the other, 
' I am big enough.' ' Well, then,' says the little pota- 
toe, ' move out of the way, and let us grow for poor 
Jerry Graham and the creatures.' ' You know very 
well,' says the big potatoe, ' that I cant't stir out of this 
until John Finnane gets his rent.' ' That's true,' says the 
other." 

The next was intended to ridicule an extravagant 
fellow, who, having no family, neglected his household 
concerns, and was ruining himself by indolence, and a 
fondness for the chase. The fairies of the Hibernian 
bards are a very different race of beings from those of 
Shakespeare. They do not hold their meetings 

" On the beached margent of the sea, 

To dance their ringlets to the whistling wind,' 

but are generally represented as a race of chubby boys 
in red jackets, with caps on their heads, and invariably 
engaged in the diversion of goal playing, a game some- 
what resembling our cricket. 

11 So good a rider David Foy was, and so notable a 
creature was his horse, that he left hounds, hunt, hare, 
and all behind him. On he went, and he was going, 
going, going, until he came to a great valley. And 
there he saw a number of boys, with red ja kets, and 



IRISH SATIRE. 379 

Caps on their heads, and hurlies in their hands, playing 
goal. David Foy began to be afraid, for he knew 
where he was. Presently, an old hag came and offered 
him something to drink ; he refused it, for he knew it 
was not good to take drink from the like.* 'Take it,' 
said the old hag, ' and don't spare, it is David Foy's 
cider, and long may he live, we don't want for the best 
he has.' David went in, and made merry with them. 
By and by, in comes an ounshak witn a fine pail of 
sweet milk. ' Where did you get that V said the hag. 
' Long life to David Foy, where should I get it but out 
of his dairy ? He is out hunting, and Betsy was in the 
haggart with Tim Foulou, and I took my share with the 
cat and the dog.' ' Umph 1' says David to himself. 
Then comes in an ounshah with a firkiu of butter, aud 
another with a gammon of bacon, and all in the same 
story ' 'Tis no admiration for ye to be so fat,' says 
D/ivid, making as if he knew nothing. In a year after, 
he came to the same place ; the boys were nothing but 
skin and bone, and the old hag was scraping a raw 
potatoe to make a cake for their supper. ' Oh I the 
curse of Cromwell on you, David Foy, for a near uager 
as you are ; we haven't made a good meal on you, this 
twelve-month.' ' The more my luck/ says David." 

The last I shall at present give you, is one of more 
general application, though, as usual, an individual has 
been made the vehicle of the satirist's spleen, and no 
less an individual than a saint, and no less a saint then 
the great patron himself. While its chief point is 
aimed at those who do much, but stop short of all, 
there is likewise a sly hit at the Western folks. 

"How was it that St. Patrick did not reform all 
Ireland ? When he came over first, he walked along, 

* The lower orders of the Irish have a superstition that fairies 
have power to detain only those who accept refreshments from their 
hands. 



380 SONNET — REPENTANCE. 

preaching, and converting, and baptizing, wherever he 
came. When he came into Ossory, he baptized with- 
out preaching. When he came down to Limerick, he 
made priests, and told them to baptize and to preach j 
but when he arrived in Shanagolden, he lifted up his 
hands, and said, ' Good people, God bless ye all to the 
West I' and returned to Dublin." 



SONN ET— REPENTA N CE. 

I looked upon a dark and sullen sea, 

Over whose slumbering waves the night mists hung, 

'Till from the morn's grey breast a fresh wind sprung, 
And swept its brightening bosom joyously ! — 
Then rolled the shades its quickening breath before ; 

The glad sea rose to meet it — and each wave, 

Retiring from the wild caress it gave, 
Made summer music to the listening shore ' 

So slept my soul unmindful of thy reign; 
But the kind breath of thy celestial grace 
Hath risen ! — Oh ! let its sweetening spirit chase 
From that dark seat each mist and mortal stain, 
Till — as in yon clear water, mirrored fair — 
Heaven once more sees itself reflected there! 



THE DISPENSARY, VILLAGE LITERATURE. 



Host, Page, tft —Bless thee, doctor. — Save you, master doctor.— 
Give you good morrow, good master doctor ' 

Doctor Catus.— -Vat be all you, one, two, tree, four, come for? — B« 
gar, de herring is no dead, so as I vill kill ! 

Merry Wives of Windsor 



" Am I not punctual ? (said a medical friend, physi- 
cian to a Wexford Dispensary, on entering my apart- 
ment at an earlier hour than was precisely agreeable,) 
I am come, according to promise, to accompany you 
to our Dispensary. If Hans Holbein, (he continued, 
throwing himself into a sedia d'apoggio,) had laid the 
scene of his Triompht de la Mart in Ireland, I could 
6upply him with some sketches which, I think, would 
form no disadvantageous substitutes for the many flat 
common-places with which he has favoured us. Now, 
in the first instance, I would take him to a potatoe field, 
through which I passed yesterday on this very estate, 
(the Earl of * * *'s,) and where I was witness to a 
scene which its absentee proprietor, I hope, does not 
dream of. I would give him the outline of that scene, 
with his own whimsical distortions, and this should be 
my etching :— In the centre I should place one of those 
portly gentlemen, to whose predecessors it was said, 
1 Go forth, and take ye your scrip and your staff,' &c. ; 
and I would be careful that he had more of the scrip 
than of the staff, in the formation of the outward man ; 
otherwise, I should not be a faithful historian. He 
should point with his cane to an opeu potatoe-^ in the 



382 THE DISPENSARY 

half distance, on the left : perched upon this goodly 
eminence, I would give you a tithe-proctor with a mallet 
*n his hard, serving in the capacity of auctioneer, and 
roaring out the biddings of some decently dressed fel- 
lows, whom, by the use they make of their left hands in 
examining the devoted cups, you may judge to be 
Pakntines* On the left, in the foreground, I should 
make a group of the miserable, starving family of the 
lessee. In the distance, on the extreme left, you should 
see a skeleton horse, and cart, preparing to remove their 
all — their little winter store ; and on the extreme right, 
a miserable hovel, or cabin. To complete the allegori- 
cal part of the satire, I would have Death, under the 
usual figure of a squektte, with a spade lifted over the 
churchman's head, pour lui casser la tele. He should 
have the white shirt of a Rockite thrown over his grisly 
bones, and his os frontis should be smeared with bog- 
dust." 

" I should recommend to you, (said I,) to make a 
rough draft of the thing, and show it to your friend 
F , at the Glebe." 

"Then my next sketch should be taken from a 
Country Dispensary. Death should be here placed be- 
hind the counter, employed after his own heart, under 
all the authority of a wig and diploma ; and I would 
have a junior skeleton at his side, with a mortar in 
one hand, and a pestle in the other, fiercely engaged in 
compounding for the miserable looking applicants." 

" And would you make this one before us sit for the 
picture?" said I. 

" Ho ! sir ; no, no, (he exclaimed,) the W Dis- 
pensary is acknowledged to be an exception : — Come 

* I should suppose there is no necessity for explaining this word. 
There exists a very sincere hatred of these folks in the southern coun- 
ties of Ireland, and indeed, 1 believe there is no lovo wasted on their 
side 



VILLAGE LITERATURE. 383 

\a, come in." — The door was opened, and a rush com- 
menced, some idea of which may be formed by those 
who have waited half-an-honr at the pit door of Drury 
Lane, in the first run of " The Cataract." 

" Good morrow, doctor. Ah ! then, long life to your 
honour ; how does the young mistress, and Master 
Tom, and the old man of all, Sir ? May be you havn't 
any time to look at this bit of ticket, plase your hon- 
our ; 'tis from old Hartigan*, Sir," (the treasurer to 
the concern.) "Very well, very well, my good man , 
sit down, sit down. — I don't know, (said the Doctor 
to me, while he made his arrangements in the surgery, 
which was about half again as munificently furnished as 
that of Romeo's apothecary,) what these good people 
did ten years back, when there was no such thing as a 
dispensary in the country ; but since they have been 
established, they seem to regard it as a most unreason- 
able thing to expect that their little finger should ache 
while a doctor was in the neighbourhood, and to think 
that it would be a kind of suicidal act if they failed to 
make the case known. An unwise fellow would quarrel 
with them on occasions of this kind, but I humour them 
— set their minds to rest, save myself trouble, and 
make my reputation. You shall see one of those very 
extraordinary cases before we have done. Well, Mrs. 
O'Hierlohee, and what's the matter with you, pray ?" — 
"Why, theu, Sir, I can hardly tell what ails me, but 
I'm very bad entirely." — "Do you sleep well, Mrs. 
O'H ?"— " Oh 1 very well, Doctor "— " And do you eat 
well V — " Oh ! theu, it is'nt so bad with me, but I can 
eat a little, Doctor."—" And drink well ?"— " I can't 
say but I do, indeed, your honour." — "Well, then, 
what is the matter with you, Mrs. O'H.?" — "Why, 
then, I dou't know, Doctor ; oidy I'm very bad entirely 

* This familiar way of naming their betters, behind their backs, if 
very usual among the peasantry. 



334 THE DISPENSARY — 

—entirely."—" Oh ! is that it ? Well, we'll get yon 
over that; sit down a moment" He let me see the 
prescription, which was quite as novel and as nugatory 
as the case itself ; it was given in this form :— 

Aquae fontanis iv oz. 

c Aquae pur® 
( Aqua) distill® • • - a a ij oz 

Tinct Tolut. ... gtt y 

Fiat mist, hora somni sumend. 

And we had the satisfaction to learn that it was suc- 
cessful a la merveille. 

" Well, Mr. M'Coy, what has happened to your 
hand, that you have bound up there — what ails it ?" — 
" Why, then, Doctor, (said the man, advancing his 
head obliquely, with a knowing, confidential look,) 1 
believe 'tis some of my sins that's going to be forgiven 
me ! I never had such punishment in my life, since I 
was born." — "How did it happen?" — "How did i+ 
happen 1 Why, then, I'll tell your honour that same. 
To be engaged to cut rape for — there he is — Switzer, 
the Palentine, and it to be Michaelmas-day — a re- 
trenched holiday, and I, never to know it, till I run the 
raping-hook right across my fingers 1 — And, upon the 
vestment I could swear, it was unknownst to me I did 
it ; for, though it be retrenched, I know 'tisu't good to 
break it for all." 

The Irish are a nation of intuitive huvibugs ; and 
they succeed better in their essays on their superiors, 
because they cover their shrewdness with a simplicity 
really natural My friend was boasting to me how per- 
fectly he was au fait with respect to their qualifications 
in this respect, when a woman, who had asked without 
avail the four and fiftieth time for a little grain of 
ornate, (ernato,) turned to one of her companions, who 
was beiug congratulated by another on her perfect 
recovery, and said, as if apart, " Ah 1 then, Mary, you 



VILLAGE LITERATURE. 385 

may thank the Doctor for that." — " Sure, I know I 
may, Koth," said Mary. — "The Lord be good to them 
that sent us a clever and a civil gentleman, that knows 
his business." — The finesse was irresistible ; and she 
went off immediately in triumph with her prize. 

In the afternoon, I accompanied " the Doctor" to see 
a patient (on a visiting ticket,) who was ill of a brain 
fever. Th'j messenger told us he was the great Mr. 
Davy Dooley, the poet of the village ; and added, as a 
kind of hint to my friend, if he was at all ambitious of 
immortality, that David wrote a song in praise of Dr. 

, the last physician who attended him, and that the 

neighbours said there was a dale of very line English in 
it. " But I don't know, please your honour, what is it 
makes poets so unlucky. Davy never did well iu his 
life : I think myself 'tis the curses of the people that 
they make the songs upon, that falls upon them.* 
Davy never had any luck since he wrote one upon 
Father Phelim, where he says, 

"Go, kneel and pray — or fight and play, 
Or drink, or what ye will ; 
But bring your grist on Christmas-day, 
To Father Phelim's mill ! " 

When we arrived at the clay-walled dwelling of this 
village Juvenal, we found it crowded almost to suffoca- 
tion with the gossips and the literati of the whole 
neighbourhood. Never was mortal so pestered with 
queries of "Well, Doctor, what do you think of him? 
Will he do, Sir?" as my poor friend was on his sortee 
from the inner chamber, which was separated by a 
hurdle from the outer, where, in the midst of the hushed 
assembly, stood the redoubted Father Phelim, himself, 

* This is so curiously characteristic an observation, that perhaps it 
is worth while to say it is not an invention "With mine own ear 
heard it." 



336 THE DISPENSARY 

much to his credit, haranguing them on the absurdity 
of the idea that the poet's brain was visited for its own 
wicked creations, at the same time that he condemned 
these last. Let me here offer a plea for that much 
injured, much misrepresented, homely, honest class, the 
Catholic priesthood of the country parishes. Nothing 
can be more unfair, more untrue, than the allusions 
sometimes made to their comfortable mode of living, 
and their love for it. A poor farmer will fix on one of 
his sons to be made a priest of ; a classical education 
can be procured in Ireland for a few pounds ; and this 
lad, after having achieved a parish, which may bring 
him in about thirty pounds a year — sometimes scarcely 
so much — is saddled with the care of a few sisters, a 
sister's child, sometimes a young brother, or an old 
aunt, or a widowed mother ; and these he must provide 
for, until taken off his hands in one way or other. 

Of the character of one of this class, Father Phe- 
lim's harangue (with the conclusion of which I shall 
conclude,) furnished an example. There is nothing 
profane or disrespectful in my quoting it, as it was 
given in a social, not a ministerial capacity : — 

'"Tisn't any fine, classical poetry we see ye about 
writing ; sweet, neat lines, such as — there he is — 
Palemon and Daphnis used to make in Horace long 
ago. No ; these times are gone by. We have nothing 
now but nuga canorce, as Homer says. Oh 1 if Tytyrus 
or Virgil were to rise out of their graves, and see such 
verses coming after them, I wonder what would they 
say to it ? Sorrow a bit, if they wouldn't be ashamed 
they ever printed a line, or handled a pen and paper. 
Avenis cerajunclis tu indocte, cum in triviis, SfC, as Meli- 
bceus says ; as much as to say, " You illiterate fellow, 
you go for to sing on the bontns, when you should be 
closiug brogues with wax." 



*r 



THE IRISH FUNERAL CRY 



No.— 

Porque Io 

No quiero que me mejore 

Quien cante, sitio quien llore ! 

Catderon's El major monstruo los Zelot. 



In all other imitations of human feeling and mannef 
with which poetry furnishes us, (if we allow John Dry- 
den's position — that all poetry is but imitation,) we 
have only one plain and almost undeviating path by 
which the imitator tends towards his object ; but the 
avenues to that deep and single one, the pathos of 
Nature, are various and innumerable as the different 
grades by which in the hearts of men it ascends to its 
climax. All men have at least the capability of this 
feeling, if of no other ; and therefore it is, that in the 
early life of poetry, when it has only nature to imitate, 
it excels in the naked delineation of the true pathos of 
the heart. Every poet of nature has pathos, and each 
a pathos of his own. Read the death scene of Web- 
ster's " White Devil ;" read Burns' Epistle to his friend 
Andrew ; read the " La vida es eueno" of *he wild and 
irregular, but powerful writer from whom I have taken 
my motto ; read the two last acts of Lear, (not Tate's, 
but Shakspeare's ;) and read the "But was't a misera- 
ble day ?" of the weak and heroic, and mean and 
noble Belvidera : — you will weep over all, but you will 
compare none ; it is a different feeling that agitates you 
in each. 



388 TBE IRISH FUNERA1 CRT 

This has been regarded as the prominent and distin- 
guishing merit, both of the ancient poetry and mnsic of 
Ireland ; but it was not my intention now to speak of 
these elder worthies ; I merely sat down to tell yon a 
little eircnmstanee of which I was myself a witness, 
some months since, in a little village in the south-west 
of Ireland, — a district which has lately excited a melan- 
choly interest. The custom of crying aload at funerals 
in that country is well known, and has certainly a very 
powerful, though not a very pleasing effect on those 
who have been accustomed to the silent and cold deco- 
rum with whieh we follow the remains of our acquaint- 
ances to their long home in this. But those who close 
their ears at the first intrusion of this strange simulta- 
neous wailing of many voices and few hearts, are very 
widely mistaken if they imagine that it is the easy 
acquisition of all, or that it is so unmusical in solo, as 
it is in tb© aggregate. It is held just in the same 
esteem among the peasantry, as a very perfect intimacy 
with Mozart, Handel, or Rossini, is in circles more 
polite. An Irish swain, in describing his mistress to 
yon, will place her affections in this ratio : " Ah I but 
she is a very dever girl, with a white skin ; and (shak- 
ing his head) she has a peat cry with her." I have 
actually known of many conquests made by well-graced 
maidens ; and what appears still more extraordinary, 
conquests planned by them, in the train of a l'uiieral, 
and in the wailing of a friend's death I I have heard 
the performers in those singular choruses taken to pieces 
in a cottage coterk on the subsequent evening, with as 
knock malice, and as great an affectation of critical 
acumen, and as little of human mercy, as is here exhib- 
ited in the dissection of the young performers in a Lent 
Concert or Oratorio. " Why, Mary, yo% didn't cry to- 
day, at all, at all." "Indeed, then, but it wasn't that 
there was no room for worse than Mary, ' said a third 



THE IRISH FUNERAL CRV. 389 

" Well, to be sure, it isn't good to judge ; but if ever 
e'er a girl did make a mitt/uine of herself, Kitty Kilmar- 
tin was that girl this day. She made the whole church- 
yard laugh. There she was, with her ydlow jock and 
her white handkitcher, and her pay colour ribbin, and she 
crying for the bare life, and sorrow a note she had, no 
more uor the gorsoon that drov the truckle" " I wonder 
what would Thady say if he seen her." " Who is 
Thady ?" " A boy of the Galahoos, that was looking 
after her ; but Kitty went in service to a blue heart, 
(Anglice, Protestant,) and — there's a month there sine* 
— she weut to mass with one of the mistress's books, 
with a fine red cover ; but what should Thady be doing 
but sitting behind her, unknownst, and she having the 
wrong side of the book to-wards her. Thady seen how 
'twas, and he never come nigh her after ; and, ('tisn't 
good to judge,) but, Kitty Kilmartiu ! set up for to cry 
over the dead corpse ! — Gondoutha /" 

You see, therefore, that sincerity is not even thought 
of. But I have been fortunate euough to hear tlus 
melaucholy and wild piece of monotony in its perfection, 
for I heard it when it was sincere — when it sprung from 
and gave expression to the real feeling of the heart. 
Perhaps — indeed, I am sure — that I shall be looked on 
as a heretic in the musical creed of the day, if I fiud 
the hardiness to affirm, that the compass and modula- 
tion and volume of a Catalina would not have produced 
such an effect on me ; but I save myself yet, by 
acknowledging that this was in a great measure the 
result of the attending circumstances. At the east side 
of the romantic little village of Adare is an old church, 
which has been for some time a prohibited spot to the 
sexton's spade ; and a number of mouldering and grass- 
covered tombs are seen around its walls, in what was 
once a church-yard, but it is now almost a field. I 
remember, a few years since, walking from Limerick to 



890 THE IRISH FUNERAL CRY. 

to tills village in an evening. It was a Christmas Eve. 
Every cottage and cabin on the road-side presented a 
picture of at least a temporary cheerfulness. The elder 
folks were employed in festive preparations, such as 
they were, for the following day ; and the little urchins 
gazing with wonder on the great mould candle which, 
for one night only, throughout the year, usurped the 
place of the little slender rush-light, or still feebler slip 
of bog-deal, — a simple and frugal substitute, which con- 
tents them well for their own convenience, but is not 
deemed worthy to honour this season of universal joy- 
auce. It was a fine wiuter night — calm, clear, and 
cold. I had fully entered into the pleasant spirit which 
breathed all around, when a sndden turn in the road 
brought me almost close to the church I speak of. 
I stopped to look at the ruin, and a peasant who 
accompanied me, pointed out, under an elder tree, a 
woman sitting on one of the tombs, her gown turned 
over her head, which was bent forward on her knees. 
I was surprised and affected by the singular contrast 
which the scene presented. Her story may be said in 
ten words : She was a widow, who depended for all 
upon the exertions of an only son. He loved and hon- 
oured her ; but he was misled — he was a Rockite. The 
policy in those cases recommends the execution of the 
culprit who falls into the hands of justice, as near as 
possible to his home ; so that this unfortunate youth 
had suffered almost opposite his mother's door. It was 
from her I heard the cailach in its perfection. Every 
Christmas Eve since his death, while other parents 
laughed at their fire-sides, she had spent at her boy's 
tomb, and sung it to his bones. It was a loud and 
thrilling cry, followed by a modulated descent, and 
ending in broken sobs and half-muttered sentences. 
These last, my companion, in his own rude way, ren- 
dered into English for me ; but the matter of each, I 



THE IRISH FUNERAL CRY. 391 

thought strongly expressive of the utter solitude of 
soul, the mournful and desolate feeling, which is occa- 
sioned by the reflection that we stand aloue in a crowd, 
— things of the world, yet having no tie of interest or 
affection with it. The circumstance altogether struck 
me as being peculiarly characteristic of the almost 
romantic depth of feeliug which stamps the mind of a 
country, where the ties of relationship are drawn more 
closely than, perhaps, in any other in the civilized 
world ; where, to use a phrase current among them- 
selves, " a man's child is always his child ;" for the 
interests of a family are seldom divided. I speak now, 
only of the peasantry. 

The following are the ideas of the Lament ; but I 
will not say that the poetical dress has improved them, 
though I have endeavoured to retain their simplicity : 



O, what shall be my Christmas joy 

When the pleasant day is come 1 
To think upon my murdered Boy, 

And weep upon his tomb ! — 
Mothers of children ! — should you plain 1 

Oh ! you are stricken light by fate — 
A home and love to you remain, 

But I am desolate ! — 
Eleu ! Eleu ! 
And is he dead ! and ia he gone 1 — 
My life ! my child ! my only one ! 



I saw my father's eyes grow dim, 

And I clasped my mother's knee; 
. saw my mother follow him, 

And my husband wept with me ! 
My husband did not long remain, 

But his child was left me yet ; 
Oh ! my child — my heart's laet love is slain, 

And I am desolate ! — 
Eleu! Eleu! 
Am 1 is he dead 1 and is he gone 1 
My all in all !— my only one ! 



ST. SINON'S ISLE. 



Would not the traditional name of this Saint, Sinon, 
nave been much better suited to the light and graceful 
versification of the Irish bard, than the chilling, classi- 
cal one he has chosen — Senanus? It does not, how- 
ever, matter much ; for the little song he has founded 
on this old legend, is one of the feeblest and least pop- 
ular of all his melodies. Walking some time since, near 
the village of Kildimo, in the county of Limerick, my 
attention was directed, by a countryman who accom- 
panied me, to an old dismantled castle between us and 
the Shannon's side. In the south wall of the ancient 
pile, I could perceive a round orifice, which he told me 
was the handi-work of one of Cromwell's cannon balls. 
The castle, he informed me, belonged in early times to 
a chief of the Butler family, who had " come by his end 
after a very quart manner." I chuckled at the prospect 
of a traditional story, and begged him to proceed. 
" Why, sir," he continued, " he was a very savage 
man ; when a serving man forgot his commands, or a 
thing of the kind, he made no more ado, but ordered 
him to be hung up on that old elder tree your honour 
sees before the gate. It was in these same times that 
St. Sinon took to the Island of Scattcry, near Kilrush, 
and made his protest that no woman should ever set 



ST. sinon's isle. 393 

foot on its ground. When old Butler /team tell of this, 
he seut off word to St. Siuon, that he should expect 
tribute from him. St. Sinon sent him back for an 
answer, that what he had was God's gift, and he'd pay 
no' man a tithe on it. To be sure old Butler was very 
mad at this ; aud to be sure 'tis he that did raise the 
great faction to exterminate him from the face of the 
earth. But Sinon took it easy, and said to tliem that 
wanted him to fly, "' No," says he, " tisu't me —'tis the 
blessed Heaven that he's threat'uing ; and wee'll see 
what will come of it — and the sooner the better," says 
he. And to be sure, true enough the Saint's words 
come. Butler stood on the Shannon's side, with his men 
around him, and his ships upon the water. When they 
had embarked, he was about to step iuto the skiff, 
when his foot slipped ; he shot like an arrow under the 
boat, aud was never heard of after 1" 

The tale of the peasant excited in me a wonderful 
desire to visit this far-famed little islet. On returning 
to the cottage where I made my sojourn, at Ringmoy- 
lan, (the estate of Lord Charleville,) I proposed the 
excursion to Miss O'Shaughnessy of Pallas Kenry, a 
blooming personification of the belle ideate of Irish grace 
aud beauty, and to her sister's husband's cousin, Mr. 
Thady O'Histin, of Killimicat, a young gentleman who 
had been ouce to Loudon, and since his return, affected 
to despise every thing Hibernian : he cast away his vul- 
gar family name, or rather qualified it, by writing Mr. 
Thaddeus Hastings on his cards, to the great vexatiou 
of his guardian and uncle, an old Histiu, who was 
proud of the name. The blue eyes of Miss O'S. spark- 
led with rapture when I asked her to accompany us, 
and Mr. Thaddeus wondered what was to be seen there. 
" Why," said Miss O'Shaughnessy, " sure you have 
heard of the ruins, Thady ? the eleven churches, and 
the round tower?" Mr. T. began to talk of Westmiu- 



394 ST. sinon's isle. 

fiter Abbey and Stonehenge ; and his cousin's wife's 
Bister repeated the word's of Moore's melody, dwelling 
With peculiar emphasis on the last lines : — 

But legends hint, that had the maid 

'Till morning's light delayed, 
And given the saint one rosy smile, 
She ne'er had left his lonely isle ! 

The trip was at length agreed on. We were supplied 
with all the local information necessary by the Physician 
of the neighbouring dispeusary, a very clever young fel- 
low, (who, I hope, if he sees this, will remember his old 
companion,) and the next morning we set off for Lim- 
erick, in the jingle. On arriving at Swinbourne's 
Hotel, we found that the Lady of the Shannon, steam 
packet, was to sail for Kilrush on the following day. 

Behold us, then, on the deck — a beautiful and 
breathless morning — admiring the splendid scenery of 
the Shannon side. Miss O'Shaughnessy, as she called 
herself ; or Miss Shannissy, as her sister's husband's 
cousin called her ; or Miss O'Shochnassy, according to 
the delicate euphtdsme of the steward of the vessel — 
peering through the captain's telescope at the receding 
summit of Keeper's Hill, and the turrets of St. Mary's 
steeple ; her brother lying on a bench in affected ennui ; 
and Master Oscar * * taking his notes at the binnacle 
with a most furious eagerness. We arrived at Kilrush, 
hired a cot, and proceeded to the isle of St. Sinon. It 
contains eleven churches and a round tower, which, con- 
sidering that it is not half-a-mile round, is no trifling 
allowance. In some of these are many curious pieces 
of sculpture, and the obelisk itself is one of the most 
perfect I have seen. It may be discerned on the hori- 
zon long before the islaud is visible. There is a flag in 
one of the churches, which, say the dwellers of the 
shore, has been often sought as a curiosity by antiquari- 



st. sinon's isle. 395 

ai.s ; but, though four men may with ease lift and carry 
it to the water's edge, no human power can move it into 
a boat for the purpose of removal 1 The islaud is at 
present uninhabited. 

During a dejev-ni, which we took on the grass, Miss 
O'Shaughnessy lamented that we should have no genius 
to panegyrize such a fine stream as the Shannon, and 
such noble scenery as we had that day witnessed. Sir, 
this was touching me in the tender side ; I have been 
always dabbling in " the crambo jingle," as Burns calls 
it, and I remembered the words of that poet : — 

The lllisus, Tiber, Thames, and Seine, 
Glide sweet in mony a tuneful line — 
But, Willie, set your fist to mine, 

An' cock your crest ; 
We'll gnr our streams and birnies shino 
Up wi' the best ! 

I plucked up a sudden courage, and I resolved to 
surprise Miss O'S. and her sister's husband's cousin. 
She declared that the lines were " very, very handsome, 
indeed ;" but I had the mortification to over-hear Mr. 
Tnaddeus whispering to her, " that he would fee any 
weeper she pleesed," that if I sent them to the Literary 
Gazette, they would be rejected 1 However, this did 
not much move me, for I always held his judgment in 
contempt. To prove this, I shall subjoin them : 

A RIVER SONG. 



Merrily whistles the wind of the shore 

Through the lithe willow, 
But wearily drops the boatman's oar, 

On the calm billow: — 
'Tis silent there — although it sing 

So freshly on the land ; 
The feather shook from the wild duck's wing 

Scarce finds the strand ! — 



3y<> A RIVER SONO. 

Then do not fear — up, maiden, and hoar 

The gushing billow- 
In the deep* silent of the night 

Lie on your pillow ; 
But wake with the waking of the day-light — 
As fresh and as fair, and as blushing and bright. 

n. 

Is it not pleasanter thus to steal 
O'er the water — than on a dull bed 

To toss in the wasting sun, and to feel 
The heavy air over your head — 

For this keea, elastic wind ! Look back ! 

Ha ! how fleetly 

St. Mary's turrets fade from our track — 
And how sweetly 

The ihi mo of its bells comes o'er the ear, 

W its vhe rush of the Shannon's waters here '•— 



Ob ! it is pleasant to mark the lark, 

When the dark brow ot night is clearing. 
Give greeting to the dawn — and — hark ! 
Waked by the dashing of our bark, 

Through the green waves careering ; 
The plover and the shrill curlew 

Round us screaming- 
Startle thy silent shore, Tiervoo ! 

Where the beaming 
Of the unshrouded, morning sun, 
Finds pleasant scenes to smile upon ! — 



'Tis noon ! the Racef is past ! — 'Tis even — 

Ha! see St. Sinon's Isle — 
With its high round tower, and churches eleven, 

Bathed in the evening's smile — 
And deeper — and fainter — and fainter stilt 

That smile is growing— 
And now the last flush is on the hill, 

Wasting and glowing — 
And now in the west there's a bickering bright, 
'Tis the triumph of darkness! the death of light !— 

• •• Dead night — dun night— the silent of the night." 

Shaktptart. 
t The Race : A part of the Shannon, near Tarbert and Clonderlan Bey- 
nere It dllatca itself so as to resemble a large lake. 



8T. 



sinon'b irh 3P7 



Now stoal we under the drowsy shoro — 
Our toil is done ! our sailing o'er !— 
How lovely thou lookest, young maiden, now 
Thy cheek is flushed— and on thy brow, 

White— soft— and sleek- 
One purple rein is faintly seen 

Like a thin streak 
Of the blue sky shown through a silrer aloud, 
When the dun tan liei in ail morning abroad f 



THE BELLS OF ST. MARY'S. 



• Those evening bells — those evening bells !" 

Moore's National Melodies. 



There is a delight which those only cau appreciate who 
have felt it, in recalling to one's mind, when cast by 
fortune upon a strange soil and among strangers, the 
sights and sounds which were familiar to one's infant 
days. It is pleasant too ; though perhaps, like the 
praise of one's own friend, rather obtrusive, to snatch 
those memories from their rest and give them to other 
ears, — to tinge them with an interest, and bid them 
live again. When ws perceive, likewise, that places and 
circumstances of real beauty and curiosity remain neg- 
lected and unknown for want of " some tongue to give 
their worthiness a voice," their is a gratification to our 
human pride in the effort to procure them, even for 
a space : 

A forted residence 'gainst the tooth of time 
And razure of oblivion. 

I shall not in this letter, as in my last, give any thing 
characteristic — any thing Irish. I will be dull, rather 
thau desceud from the elevation I intend to keep ; but, 
in compensation, I will tell you a fine old Story, and if 
you have but the slightest mingling of poetical feeling 
in your composition, (and who is there now-a-days that 
will not pretend to some?) — I promise myself that you 
shall not be disappointed. 



THE BELLS OF ST. MARY'S. 399 

The city of Limerick, though surrounded by some 
very tolerable demesnes, is sadly deficient in one res- 
pect, not an unimportant one in any large town. There is 
no public walk of any consequence immediately adjoin- 
ing it. The canal which leads to Dublin is bleak, from 
its want of trees ; and unhealthy, from the low marshy 
champagne which lies on either side its banks This 
however, for want of something better, was for a con- 
siderable time the fashionable promenade, until the 
formation of the Military Walk on the western side ; 
to which the beauties of Limerick — (a commodity quite 
as celebrated, and some malicious wags say, almost as 
marketable, in an honourable way, as Limerick gloves) 
— have given, among themselves, the witty appellation of 
the path to promotion. 

But at the head of this canal, where it divides itself 
into two branches, which, gradually widening and 
throwing off their artificial appearance, form a glittering 
circlet around a small island which is covered with water 
shrubs — on this spot, I have delightedly reposed in 
many a sweet sunset — when I loved to seek a glimpse 
of inspiration in £uch scenes — to imitate Moore's poe- 
try — and throw rhymes together, about the rills and 
hills, and streams and beams, and even and heaven, and 
fancy I was a genius 1 — " 'Tis gone — 'tis gone — 'tis 
gone 1" as old Capulet says. 

But let us recall it for a moment. Have the complai- 
sance to indulge me in a day-dream, and fancy, if you 
can, that you sit beside me on the bank. We are be- 
yond the hearing of the turmoil and bustle of the town 
— " the city's voice itself is soft — like solitude's" — and 
there is a hush around us that is delightful — the beau- 
tiful repose of evening. The sun, that but a few 
minutes since rushed down the west with the speed of a 
wandering star, pauses ere he shall set upon the very 
verge of the horizon, and smiles upon its own handi* 



400 THE BELLS OF ST. MARY'S 

work — the creation of his fosteriDg fer7onr. Hark ! 
one sound alone reaihes us here ; and how grand and 
solemn and harmonious in its monotony ! These are the 
great bells of St. Mary's. Their deep toned vibrations 
undulate so as to produce a sensible effect on the air 
around us. The peculiar fineness of the sound has beeu 
often remarked ; but there is an old story connected 
with their history, which, whenever I hear them ring 
out over the silent city, gives a something more than 
harmony to the peal. I shall merely say, that what I 
am about to relate is told as a real occurrence, and I 
consider it so touchingly poetical in itself, — that I shall 
not dare to apply a fictitious name and fictitious cir- 
cumstances where I have been unable to procure the 
actual ones. 

They were originally brought from Italy ; they had 
been manufactured by a young native (whose name the 
tradition has not preserved,) and finished after the toil 
of many years, and he prided himself upon his work. 
They were subsequently purchased by the prior of a 
neighbouring convent ; and with the profits of this sale, 
the young Italian procured a little villa, where he had 
the pleasure of hearing the tolling of his bells from the 
convent cliff, and of growing old in the bosom of domes- 
tic happiness. This, however, was not to continue. In 
some of those broils, whether civil or foreign, which are 
the undying worm in the peace of a fallen land, the 
good Italian was a sufferer amongst many. He lost his 
all ; and, after the passing of the storm, found himself 
preserved alone amid the wreck of fortune, friends, 
family, and home. The convent in which the bells, the 
chefs-d'oeuvre of his skill, were hung, was razed to the 
earth, and these last carried away into another land. 
The unfortunate owner, haunted by his memories, and 
deserted by his hopes, became a wanderer over Europe. 
His hair grew grey, and his heart withered, before he 



THE BELLS OF ST. MARY'S. 401 

again found a home or a friend. In this desolation of 
spirit, he formed the resolution of seeking the place to 
which those treasures of his memory had been finally 
borne. He sailed for Ireland — proceeded up the Shan- 
non ; — the vessel anchored in the Pool, near Limerick, 
and he hired a small boat for the purpose of landing. 
The city was now before him ; and he beheld St. Mary's 
steeple, lifting its turretted head above the smoke and 
mist of the Old Town. He sat in the stern, and looked 
fondly toward it. It was an eveniug so calm and 
beautiful, as to remind him of his own native heaveu in 
the sweetest time of the year — the death of the spring. 
The broad stream appeared like one smooth mirror 
and the little vessel glided through it with almost a 
noiseless expedition. On a sudden, amid the general 
stillness, the bells tolled from the Cathedral — the rowers 
rested on tueir oars, and the vessel went forward with 
the impulse it had received. The old Italian looked 
toward the city, crossed his arms ou his breast, and lay 
back in his seat ; home, happiness, early recollections, 
frieuds, family — all were in the sound, and went with it 
to his heart. When the rowers looked round, they beheld 
him with his face still turned toward the Cathedral, 
but his eyes were closed, and when they landed — they 
found him cold 1 

Such are the associations which the ringing of St. 
Mary's bells bring to my recollection. I do not know 
how I can better conclude this letter than with the little 
Melody, ot which I nave given the line above. It is a 
good specimen of the peculiar tingling melody of the 
author's poetry — a quality in which he never has been 
equalled in his own language, nor exceeded in any other ; 
although, like a great many more of his productions, it 
has very little merit besides — Why 1 — you can almost 
fancy you can hear them ringing 1 — 



402 THE BELL3 OF ST. MART'S 

Those evening bells— those evening bells- 
How many a tale their music tells 
Of youth and home — and that sweet tint* 
When last I heard their soothiDg chime! 

Those pleasant hours have passed away, 
And many a heart that then was gay — 
Within the tomb now darkly dwells, 
And hears no more those evening bells. 

And so 't will be when I am gone, 
That tuneful peal will still ring on — 
When other bards shall walk those dells, 
jlnd ting your praise — sweet evening belk 



LOCAL SUPERSTITIONS. 



Oh monstrous — oh strange — we art, tiaunted! 
Pray, masters, fly — masters, help ! 

Midsummer Night's Dream 



There >• something good humoured in Irish super- 
stition — something qui donne de la joie nans m peur. We 
have no witches— none of those ugly, ill-favoured, earth- 
ly realities, which brutalize and stupify the minds of a 
portion of our own boors ; but there is scarce a hill, a 
lough, a dingle, a fort, or an old ruin, which does not 
call up within the peasant's mind some wild and poeti- 
cally fearful association. 

Let me see : — Here I have them — all that I was ena- 
bled to collect from the country people, who are quite 
as communicative as they are inquisitive — I have them 
in petto before me in a stoutly bound note book, which 
was the constant companion of my pedestrian excur- 
sions. A. B. C. — F. K. L. — Limerick — aye, this it the 
page. Here I begin my faery tour — Limerick, — yes : 
I have got a great many good things under this head. 
Heavens ! what a gorgeous display they make as I let 
the pages slip one after another from beneath my 
fingers : Traditions — Superstitions — Anecdotes — Points 
of Scenery — Character — Rockites — Hush 1 What have 
I said ? — All in good time : These gentlemen must take 
their turn in time, but at preseut 1 have quite another 



404 LOCAL SUPERSTITIONS. 

matter in head. I will run through these little memo- 
randa in the order in which I find them set down. 

Knuc/c Fierna. 

The hills of the fairies. This is the loftiest mountain 
in the county above named, and lifts its double peak on 
the Southern side, pretty accurately, I believe, dividing 
it from Cork. Numberless are the tales related of this 
hill by the carmen who have been benighted near it on 
their return from the latter city, which is the favourite 
market for the produce of their dairies. That there is 
a Siobrng or fairy castle in the Mount, no one in his 
senses presumes to entertain a doubt. On the summit 
of the highest peak is an unfathomable well, which is 
held in very great veueration by the peasantry. It is by 
some supposed to be the entrance to the court of their 
tiny mightinesses. A curious fellow at oue time had 
the hardihood to cast a stone down the orifice ; and 
then casting himself on his face and hands, and leaning 
over the brink, waited to ascertain the falsity of this 
supposition by the reverberation, which he doubted not 
would soon be occasioned by the missile reaching tho 
bottom. But he met with a fate scarce less tragical 
than that of poor Pug, who set fire to the match of a 
cannon, and then must needs run to the mouth to see 
the shot go off. Our speculator had his messenger 
returned to him with a force that broke the bridge of 
his nose, locked up both his eyes, and sent him down 
the hill at the rate of four furlongs per second, at the 
foot of which he was found senseless next morning. 

King Finvar's* Cattle. 

Between this mountain and the river Shannon, there 
is a small lake, concerning which a very extraordinary 

* A famous fairy monarch 



LOCAL SUPERSTITIONS. 405 

report was circulated a few years back. Some people 
indeed may imagine it a little too improbable to lend a 
very ready credence to it, but I can assure them that 
its veracity was not even questioned at the time it took 
place. The lake or lough to which I allude is a very 
pretty one, although it is disfigured on one side by a 
piece of ugly bog. On the East, it is overlooked by a 
hill which makes a very sudden descent on its bauk ; 
but the slope is delightfully covered with mountain ash, 
birch, aud hazel trees, so as to form a very pleasant con- 
trast to the dreary flat opposite. At the northern end of 
the water, among patches of rude crag, and occasional 
spots of green, a few thatched hovels or cabins are huddled 
together, so as to form a something indescribably mis- 
erable in appearance, which is dignified with the ap- 
pellation of a village : it is nailed Killimicat. Not very 
far from this, and on the borders of the lake — But what 
arc these stories worth if taken out of the mouth of the 
original narrator? I shall give this to you as I had it 
myself: — You see that little meadow there over-right 
us, Sir, — that was the little spot that Morty Shannon 
took from the master. Morty was a snug sculog then, 
and very well to do there, as I hear ; but a stronger 
man than he was could not stand any thing of a loss in 
such times as they were. Morty wondered what was it 
that used to spoil the growth of his little meadow. 
There was no sign of trespass from the neighbours, for 
the bounds were good, and their cattle were all spotted- 
led. But so it was : sorrow a bit of grass did he ever 
cut on the field for two years. At last, knowing it to 
be a good bit of ground, he resolved to sit up of a night 
to see what was it used to be there : and so he did, 
himself and his two sons. About twelve o'clock, aa 
they were standing, as it might be this way, what 
Bhould they see rising out of the lake only a fine big 
cow and seven heifers, aud they making towards his 



406 LOCAL SUPERSTITIONS. 

little field. ' Tha guthini r says Morty to himself, 'is 
this the way of it V So he beckoned to his sous to come 
leiune them and the lake, and turn them into the pound. 
The old cow seen what they were about, and, without 
ever speaking a word, made a dart right between the two 
sous and into the water with her. But the heifers they 
drove home, and inclosed them in a paddock, where 
they staid for a year ; until one evening the gorsoon for- 
got to lock the gate, when they all made off into the 
lake, and were never heard of more." 

It is said there is a magnificent palaee under this 
water, one of whose turrets is visible above the surface 
in a dry summer. This report is quite as well attested 
as the other. 

Old Raths. 

These very ancient places are a favourite haunt of 
the elves ; and woe to the hardy man who dares to ap- 
ply the axe or the spade to tree, shrub, or soil, in these 
hallowed spots. They are very numerously scattered 
over the face of the country, and form great eye-sores 
to the improving class of landholders, who have acquir- 
ed wit enough to contemn the superstition, but lack 
courage to adventure first in the cause of common 
sense. I knew one stout man who lost an eye in the 
attempt to root out an old thorn on one of these places ; 
another who had a fine meadow turned up and destroyed 
for his pains ; and a third, who declared that the very 
night after he had superintended an exploit of a similar 
kind, he saw three siteogs, in the shape of strapping 
bucaughs, take each a cleave of turf from the reek in 
front of his house. The reality of this latter appear- 
ance I was not at all inclined to question. 



THE HOAX 



Notwithstanding the title under which I have mar* 
shalled this series of lucubrations, and which professes 
to confine the sense of the little events described to 
11 sweet Monomia" itself, I should be very sorry to pay 
bo much deference to consistency, as to restrain myself 
from the pleasure of taking in a flying good thing which 
I have caught at in sports to which my attention was 
less particularly directed. I shall therefore in this and 
my next letters, give you some of my first gleanings on 
my arrival in the country, and which in point of fact 
were then set down. 

Let your philosophical contributors fix the cause, I 
content myself with asserting this fact, that in every 
considerable town except Dublin, where I have yet 
sojourned, practical hoax seems to be the esteemed 
relaxation of gentlemen at large of the middle rank, 
and men of business and profession, whose facile methods 
of despatch, or whose waste time, allows them the 
primary means for its indulgence. Passing by count- 
less instances of this scientific waggery, which, if you 
had been as long as I have been in Ireland, would 
amuse you, allow me to submit one grand tour illustra- 
tive of the almost desperate extent to which it can 
reach. I am about to mention important facts and 
dates, and am aware of the authenticity upon which I 



408 TIJE HOAX. 

ought to base my narrative ; but if my own eyes and 
ears may serve, they are your warrant in attaching im- 
plicit credence to the sequel. In one word, I shall not 
state a circumstance which I do not know of my own 
knowledge. 

Thus, then, you will easily call to mind, that at the 
death of the ever-to-be-lameuted Princess, now some 
years ago, the day of interment was previously under- 
stood throughout the United Kingdom, and every town 
and village proposed to mourn the melancholy event 
on a Wednesday, I believe, with closed shops, suspen- 
sion of business, prayers and homilies. I need not 
remind you that I was then iu Ireland, partly on your 
own mission, and residing in a certain city of Ireland. 
The appointed morn rose on that certain city, as on all 
the others, and the people duteously attended, or rather 
began to attend, to the orders judicially issued for its sad 
observance. No shopkeeper unmasked the broad and 
shining face of his shop window ; no petty marketing or 
cries ushered in the day ; death-bells were knelling ; the 
loyal and pious, including the garrison, proposed to go 
to divine service ; and all the preachers in the town had 
been up two hours before their usual rising time, to 
re-con and polish the long-balanced funeral oration. 
These were the symptoms down to half-past seven 
o'clock ; but lo 1 at or about that hour, forth rushes 
the town crier, without a hat, his face pale, his looks 
wild, his gesticulation vehement, and his voice choked 
with precipitancy ; and he rings me his bell at every 
corner, and endeavours to pronounce the following : — 
" By special orders of Mr. Mayor, the funeral is not 
to take place till Friday morning. God save the king 1" 
The shops were opened, the bells ceased to toll, and 
business and bustle proceeded as usual. I went to the 
public reading-room to satisfy myself on this extraordi- 
nary occurrence The Dublin mail had not arrived ; 



THK HOAX. 409 

but the Mayor had received the news by despatch from 
the Castle the night before, and all wsis right. It was 
eight — half-past eight o'clock, and we heard, at last, 
the " twanging horn" of the mail-coach as it drew up 
at its allotted resting-place. Many a wistful eye now 
peered out of the windows adown the street to recon- 
noitre the boy, who had been for an hour before placed 
with his shoulder to the little black wooden pane in the 
shop window of " the post-office." He came at last, 
pale and breathless, and with an ominous pendency in 
his jaw — for oh 1 he had held whispering converse with 
that important inland personage, the guard of the mail, 
and his ear still rung with fearful sounds. We tore 
open the papers — the Dublin papers of the preceding 
evening, despatched at eight o'clock, six hours soonei 

than a Mercury could have left town to be in at 

one o'clock in the morning, which was the case stated. 
We tore them open, I say ; our eyes glanced like elec- 
tricity to the readings of the different journals, then to 
the tail of the column, where "second editiou," in good 
capitals, ought to have been. We did this and more. 
We — who ? The magistrates of the city among the rest, 
with the Mayor at their head ! — the wise caterers for 
public order and decorum 1 — the men of counsel and 
council I — the " Daniels — I say the Daniels !" Muse 
of Hogarth or of Rabelais 1 coquet with me only for 
one felicitous instant, while I try to paint the vaeuity 
of horror, yet redolence of the ridiculous, which bespoke 
the first full suspicion of a hoax, that was — no doubt — 
villainously — good, but also of a blunder that was exe- 
crably palpable 1 But I dare only leave this scene to 
the imagination. Let it suffice that the Mayor ap- 
pealed to his despatch from the Secretary — produced it 
— and, to mend the matter, " lo, 'twas read I" What 
could be done ? The town itself might be managed 
after a manner — the crier might make another sortie to 



410 THE HOAX 

cause the shops to be shut, and the customers turned 
out — the bells might easily be set again iu motion ; but 
the country districts, the villages six, eight, ten, fifteen 
miles off 1 At seven o'clock in the morning the two 
troops of horse in garrison had been despatched to 
these several places with orders to suspend the homilies 
till Friday : there was not a trooper left to pursue them 
with countermanding orders I — and again, I inquire, 
what could be done ? Nothing but what was done. That 
day, while all the rest of the British empire mourned, 

the city of and her dependencies waxed merry and 

busy ; and when the cloud had passed from the world 
beside, they had at last their time of exclusive sorrow. 
Any comment upon the moral propriety of this lwax 
might be out of season, — certainly would be superflu- 
ous. If contemplated to the excess it ran, there can be 
no second opinion as to the delinquency ; and in any 
view it was most indecorous, and no doubt you and your 
readers will call it shocking. But I am strongly led to 
question the first case ; and with the second can have 
little to do. I only state, as in duty bound, facts, that 
even in their excesses present to you, I think, a trait 
of national character, whose demerits at least contain 
some, and a peculiar mental activity — iu idleness. 

And since we have stumbled on national portrai- 
ture, sutfer me to present you with another feature 
which may interest. I have met more than one 
profound Munchausen in Ireland ; that is, a regular 
story-teller, who glories in his talent, who has built up 
to himself much fame and admiration from its repeated 
exercise, and whose effort is to preserve his character 
by a succession of ridiculous fictions. The king of this 
race of queer mortals is now dead ; he abode in the 
very metropolis ; was the idol of merry meetings in 
taverns, and at respectable private houses too : and, 
by all I can learn, never had compeer. His name was 



THE HOAX. 411 

Sweetraan — " Jack Sweetman " Oh ! how the bare 
mention of his name will set poor Scetch's eyes twink- 
ling, and slightly curve the right line of even Mr. O'Re- 
gan's mouth ! — As master Slender would observe, 
however, " He is dead — Jack Sweetman is dead ;" and 
those of bis unconscious emulators whom I have seen 
were not your city wags : Pure rustic geniuses they ; 
teeming with their own original conceptions, and fling- 
ing them out and about in their own quaint idiom and 
Blippery tongue. The picture of the cleverest of them 
I have encountered, is before me : A comfortable coun- 
try gentleman, about fifty years of age, tall, a little fat, 
a round red shining face, not at all strongly marked, and 
no index to his talent, if you should except the sparkle 
of two small blue eyes, rebelling against the affectation 
of gravity imposed on his well closed lips. At his own 
table, or at any other table, he was and i» the father 
of tempestuous laughter. He knows what is expected 
from him — and that is every thing — and without appar- 
ent effort he yields full and eternal satisfaction. 1 have 
heard him always with amazement, and, I must own, 
often with real excitation of spirits. We have no idea 
of such a man in England. He has told in my presence 
upon four or five occasions that I have sat with him, 
half a hundred stories at least, no one resembling the 
other, and, I have been informed by those who knew 
him long, unlike any that he had ever told before.' In 
fact, during some thirty years of professional practice, 
it would appear he scarcely ever finds it necessaiy to 
repeat himself. This you will say is imaginative fecun- 
dity with a vengeance. If you proceed to interrogate 
me on the merit or style of these extemporaneous 
effusions, I fear I can answer nothing satisfactory. 
As to matter, they are the most monstrous and 
matchless combinations of narrative, out-Munchausening 
Munchausen — always new, always jangling against 



412 THE HOAX. 

each other ; and, all I can add is fit to be laughed 
at for their very unfitness to any thing else. But 
you should hear this man tell them. There is the 
whole charm. You shall listen to him as he sits at his 
ease with his whiskey-punch before him, and his friends 
around him, and his face in its unclouded meridian, 
without a muscle wincing, as the fluent words quietly 
pour out for ever, and choke every one else with convul- 
sions of mirth. Let your fancy so far assist me as to get 
him thus present, and I proceed, as the best mode of il- 
lustration, to relate one — though by no means one of the 
best of his stories. I select it for its brevity. It would 
begin thus: " Arrah, come now — (turning to a grave 
guest) — this will never do, father Corkoran — maister, 
sir, maister — or maybe you'd be for an oyster ? We'll 
get them there ; an' I pray God there mayn't be such 
a story to tell o' them as the night last week that the 
gauger was here. I was in town that day, an' bought 
just as fine a hundred as ever was seen ; Dick put them 
down on the dairy floor to keep them cool ; and here 
we sat as we are now, God bless us all, after dinner, 
when we heard such a screeching an' hubbub as rang 
thro' the house, an' brought us out to see what was 
the matter. Into the dairy we went — an' I'll tell you 
how it happened. The rats came in, you see, in the 
dark, an' were for being curious about the oysters ; an' 
one of the oysters that was as curious an' just as cute 
as any of the rats, opened himself a little to take a 
peep about the dairy ; an' when a rat put in his fore 
foot to have a crook at the oyster, faith it held him as 
fast as it could ; which not being to the rat's mind, 
nathing could come up to the passion he gat into, an' 
the noise he made We staid some time looking on, 
an' then went out for a dog to worry the rat ; an' as 
we had to go thro' the yard to the dog, we were for 
Bteppiug down stairs quietly, when — what would you 



THE HOAX. 413 

think ? By the life of O'Pharoh, Sir, we were forced 
to stand aside, and give way to a hundred rats at least, 
that were come from borrowing a crow-bar from th6 
forge, an' they had it between them, walking up stairs 
in a body to break open the oyster an' deliver their 
namesake from his hands." I shall add no comment 
upon this fanciful narrative, further than to say, that it 
strikes me to be quite as good as the three hundred 
rats of which Mr. Hogg has made memorable use m 
bis last Novel. 



THE KILKENNY RANGERS. 



The morning after my arrival in Dublin, I called on 
Ity friend Pat Seeteh. He was not at home ; but I 
understood he might be found at the Dublin Society 
House, Kildare Street. There indeed I did find him, 
surrounded by good casts of the Elgin Marbles, and 
alternately recurring from their god, the Theseus, to a 
good cast, also, of the Farnese Hercules ; and this, as 
I afterwards understood, for the purpose of assisting 
the birth of some strange creation with which his brain 
was then its full time gone. He sprang to shake my 
hand, overturning a drawing-desk, chalks, and port- 
crayons, that now only stood in his way. I requested 
his aid to develope the then immediate place, as the 
puzzlers call it, of his friend Mr. O'Regan ; and, after 
appearing to think a second, he touched his forehead 
aud hurried me off. We came, as he informed me, to 
the Dublin Library, in D'Oliers Street, pushed into 
the news-room, aud, as if by instinct, Seeteh picked out 
from a group of loungers about the fire-place, a grave 
seeming man ; who, with his back turned to the grate, 
his hands behind his back, aud a deliberate see-saw 
motion of body, appeared, with great composure in his 
own face, to be playing at will the risible muscles 
of those around him. We were introduced : O'Regon 
bowed like a Mandarin, and we issued out together to 



THE KILKENNY RANGERS. 415 

look at the town. One month exactly I remained in 
Dublin under the pupilage of my worthy friends ; one 
month we strayed through the county Wicklow ; and 
then commenced our true internal campaign. From 
the metropolis again, a canal-boat pleasantly beguiled 
us of an uninteresting tract of country, depositing us at 
Atby, a smart town in the County Kildare, which is 
occasionally honoured by a sitting Judge of Assize. 
Hence we took a south-west course towards the heart 
of the County Kilkenny, on the backs of three sprawl- 
ing horses, our seats being similar to those we might 
enjoy in an inverted rain-bow. They contrived how- 
ever to transport us to Canticomir, a considerable vil- 
lage, overlooked and governed by the stately mansion 
of the Countess Dowager of Ormond ; and there we 
divorced ourselves from them and our guide, and joining 
hands at the serious proposition of O'Regan, vowed, 
like classic pilgrims, to walk the whole extent of our 
picturesque tour. So, behold us, with portfolio and 
kuapsacks hanging at our backs, and note-books and 
shilelaglis in hand, attracting an universal stare of 
astonishment at every mile of our way. O'Regan car- 
ried, though we did not guess it 'till evening, three bot- 
tles of Potteeu Whiskey, more compactly adjusted than 
Gilpin's " bottle at each side ;" and I know not why 
I should have omitted to inform you that a servaut of 
his, as great an original as his master, brought up our 
rear with a hand-basket of choice and tangible things, 
under which he limped aloug, a short pipe in his mouth, 
and an alternate curse at our bye-roads or hedges 
and ditches, or a growling good thing shot off in proper 
volumes of smoke, as oftening issuing through hia 
clenched teeth. I must say a word of this Man-Friday 
of ours, Peery, as his master calls him, which appella- 
tion is, I take it, a local corruption of Pierce. Peery, 
then, is a middle-sized fellow, between fifty and sixty, 



416 THE KILKENNY RANGERS. 

inclining to the latter perhaps, straight as a ram-rod, 
with a pair of squeamish good legs, of which he is not 
a little proud, a measured pace when he has the city 
flags or even a smooth road under him, and a round, 
lumpish, featureless face, which good humour and 
peevishness, endurance and impatience, sway by turns. 
He has been an old volunteer ; a corporal of artillery to 
the " Kilkenny Rangers," and this accounts for his stiff 
peculiarities of person and manner. Other marks of 
the old soldier are about him, for I can understand that 
these volunteer gentlemen may really be called soldiers. 
He wears a tight knee small-clothes, and short black 
spatter-dashes, that come a little above the ancle, but 
toning close to do common justice to the small of the 
leg. Then he has turned the old oil-silk covering of 
his helmet into a bag for his hat, and from this union 
results sin uncouth bundle of head-gear, which he has 
borne about on rainy days in the city, and on country 
excursions in all weathers, for nearly the last forty 
years. It looks not unlike a bronze vase turned upside 
down, and just rescued from the ashes of Herculaueum. 
One of Peery's privileges is to announce the hour of 
the day ; and wlien he is roused towards this office by 
his master's command, the ensuing operation is rather 
amusing. He stops short with a "Ha !" then slowly 
" pulls a dial from his poke," desiriug it, by the quaint 
name of " tell truth," to come forth and declare. First 
appears a leathern purse suspended by a steel chain, 
and carefully tied with a running string : after due pre- 
caution he takes this ofif, and then you see a large round 
machine of I know not what metal, as it is mounted 
with some kind of green compost ; and at last, looking 
at it as it reposes on the palm of his hand, with com- 
pressed lips and brows and " lack-lustre eye," Peery 

" Says, very wisely, it is ten o'clock." 



THE KILKENNY RANGERS. 4H 

After which the bag is again tied on, and the whole appa- 
ratus cautiously returned to its dwelling place. He haa 
thus carried this aute-diluvian watch since his sixteenth 
year, at which time it was bequeathed to him, bag and 
ail, by a grand uncle in the north, and Peery walked to 
the north to claim it. O'Regan never laughs at his 
invaluable man, and I can divine that he would not sell 
him for worlds. Before dinner Peery is dry and hard 
as a sea-biscuit, and you only git bits of him now and 
then, which chip off like particles of that same biscuit: 
but, still to keep up the comparison, soak him well in 
whiskey-punch, and he softens and expands, and be- 
comes palatable. 

Since I have so far wandered away with this strange 
fellow by the hand, I may continue my ramble in his 
company, particularly as you will find him versed in 
some matters I could not get so well from any other 
source. Oue of our first skirmishing walks about 
Dublin was to the Phceuix Park. My friends pointed 
out the site of a memorable review of nearly the whole 
body of Irish volunteers ; and Peery, after listeuing 
gravely to our observations, came in with his own ex- 
planation and anecdotes at last. What he had to 
say involved the character and prowess of his native 
eorps j and we were treated with a prefatory account 
of them, which, linked to the after scenes in which he 
put them into particular action, forms, I may say, an 
interesting picture of that remarkable time, and of the 
national spirit that stamped it. Let me try if I can 
collect Peery's own words. 

" I ought to know the ground well. The day the 
Kilkenny Rangers took the right o' the field, an' I 
was corporal an' bombadier o-f the Artillery, an' auld 
Bob Holmes was our captain. The Cork Blues thought 
to have id, an' wheeled past us. But they knew little 
about id, or the boys they had to deal with either. 



418 THE KILKENNY RANOERS. 

There was proud blood an' desperate hearts in the Ran- 
gers. They were well known at home in their own 
town an' comity. Before they riz (rose) up, there 
used to be snch things as theevin' an' stalin' in the 
country parts, but I'll be bound little was hard (heard) 
in id a month or so afther. The best ir id all was, 
that whin we had no thieves to hunt, we went out 
fur the sport o' the business ; fur the Rangers liked 
sport ; an' give cm a crisp frosty road, an' plenty in 
'em, good fellows togetner, with their muskets on their 
shoulders ait' free quarters afore 'em — the Lord knows 
where, only somewhere at last, you may be sure, — an' 
the devil a better cnvartion they'd ax. To tell God's 
truth, they might as well lave the robbers akoue ; fur, 
from the Lord's cellar down to the ouM woman's hen- 
roost, sorrow a much was spared afther all the good 
they done. An' so inese were the lads, with ould 
Lord Ormond an' all the Butlers at their head, an' 
their ranks made up in estated gintlemen, an^ the young 
an' the stout in the whole neighbourhood, — an* to spake 
honestly between ourselves, some o' the most finished 
scape-graces you'd maybe wish to see j these were the 
lads that the Cork Blues thought to put a wan side that 
day. Bad look to the finer set o^ fellows ever marched 
into a field. Every man had the gettin' in his own 
elothin*, an' all did their best ; an* every cap, coat, an' 
feather, that mornin' was bran new. Besides, as it was 
dry summer weather, and we had only to turn out in 
Dublin into this Park, every man wore his white cassi- 
mir small-clothes, white silk-stackins, an ; dancin' pumps. 
Into that gate we came, our drums beatiu' an' our co- 
lours fly in', an', as I said afore, or somethin' like id, oar 
Comal an' Officers the hansomest men you'd pick out 
in three counties. We were in first, an', as we said 
we'd do id, we took up the right hand place in the field, 
an' then, as I tould you, the Blues came in, and were 



THE KILKENNY RANGERS. 419 

marchin' a-head on us. " Halt there !" cries our Cornal 
as they passed, an' he rode out with his Officers, and 
comin' up to the Cornal o' the Blues, the Blues halted, 
an' the Officers discoursed together. While they were 
talkin', we were doiu'. On went our bayonets, an' every 
man put in a ball cartridge, out in his private pouch 
that we always carried about us. Myself was at the 
head o' the line with my two long pounders, an', with- 
out sayin' much, I took out my flint an' steel, an' let a 
spark fall on the match-rope. My Officer came to me, 
an' 'Never better done, Peery (says he,) where's the 
key of the ammunition-box V ' I think I have id', says 
I, showin' a thing like id at the same time. ' Right 
(says Captain Bob,) open id, Peery ; an' the first leg 
they put afore another, send 'em your compliments.' ' I 
will, Captain, as civilly as I can,' says I. By this time 
we were all faced about, right foment the Munster 
men, who didn't seem to like how we behaved ourselves, 
an', I believe, thought at last we might just as well 
have our own frolic. At all events they fell back, an' we 
led the day. 

" I'll tell you a matter about the Rangers. Afther 
the review was over — that is, in a few days afther — we 
were for marchin' home, an' passin' through Dublin, 
there was a halt in Thomas-street, somehow or other. 
As we stood on our arms, a poor fool of a bailiff stept 
up to the ranks, and tippin' Tom Kavauah, tould him 
he was the King's prisoner. 'No, (says Billy Come- 
ford, ) he's the King's volunteer soldier an' a gintleman, 
and that I'll make you know ;' so he stretched him with 
the but-end ir his musket. The poor devil tumbled among 
the ranks, au' one axed him what he wanted there, an' an- 
other, an' another ; an' there was a bayonet sent through 
his body each time. We got the word to march, an' 
every man stamped his foot on the bailiff as we passed, 
givin' liim something else along with it. I saw his 



420 THE KILKENNY RAN6ER8. 

corpse afore we left the street, an' I don't think his mo» 
ther 'ud know him if she met him. An' these were the 
men it was so asy to take the lead from in the Park : 
an' they were some of exactly the same men that the 
Parliament called saviours of their country to-day, and 
armed traitors to-morrow ; God for ever bless that Par- 
liament, wherever it is, for sayin' so." 

Behold a specimen of my friend Peery's traditional 
lore. The last anecdote with which he has furnished 
me is sufficiently shocking : but it serves to show the 
determined and daring spirit of these famous Volun- 
teers ; the desperate identity of cause and feeling be- 
tween them ; and, above all, their uncontrolled mastery 
at that period in Ireland ; — for, as I can authentically 
learn, if a dog, and not the poor fool-hardy bailiff, had 
been bayoneted, less notice could not have been taken 
of the matter. 



THE ROCKITES. 



I have promised, in a former Letter, that those 
gentry should form the subject of one of my " hours f 
and as fortune (however singular, always fortunate to 
a literary gossip) has placed it in my power to lay 
before your readers a scene — quorum pars parva fui — 
which, I flatter myself, they may not consider uninter- 
esting, I hasten to redeem my pledge. 

I was sitting quietly in the house of an acquaintance 
(a county of Limerick gentleman,) about twelve o'clock 
at noon, on a fine, still, sun-shiny day : the good lady 
of the mansion was busily engaged in preparing lun- 
cheon ; the master, a quiet, inoffensive, timid kiud of 
man, who by his neutrality during the disturbances had 
secured himself against injury on all sides, was poring 
with eyes aghast, and a countenance surcharged with 
expression which he vainly endeavoured to suppress, 
over the columns of the last Limerick Evening Post, 
where in all the authenticity of neat long primer, the 
doings of the last week were recorded, not in the most 
soothing strain of the self-alarmist, — when Pat Cahil, a 
gentleniau who did my friend the honour of offici- 
ating as groom of his stables, burst into the chamber, 
hatless, coatless, and shoeless — his whole frame evi- 
dently agitated by the extremity of consternation. It 
was some time before he could articulate — " Mr. War- 
dow 1 Mr. Wardow 1 there they are all 1 — gone up to 
the cross by the forge 1" 



422 THE ROCKITES. 

" Who V exclaimed my friend, endeavouring to pre- 
serve an appearance of dignified calmness. 

"The boys, Sir — the boys! and 'tis thought they're 
going to do something that's bad, Sir, by the Peppards,* 
Sir, now the army aru't to the fore." " Where are the 
military stationed ?" I asked. " Och, your honour, there 
isn't a sodger nearer to us than Adare ; and it's but a 
poor account you'd have o' the business be the time 
you'd get there, let alone the road back." The distant 
report of a shot instantly convinced us that this was 
but too true. I rushed towards the door, however, 
rather rudely flinging back my friend, who opposed him- 
self to my exit with the most haggard and woe-begoue 
look of entreaty I ever beheid. In a few minutes I 
reached the hill of Lisnamuck, a place which cut rather 
a conspicuous figure as a place of rendezvous on the 
nocturnal occasions of those people, and in some part 
of which knowing folks will tell you with a wink and a 
nod, an old cavern serves as an armory to the worthy 
General's forces ; but at all events I reached the sum- 
mit of the hill, and in an instant the scene of battle lay 
before me. Cappa House, the residence of Mr. Peppurd 
and his two sons, was an elderly-looking edifice, and 
apparently well-calculated to sustain a seige in which 
musketry were the heaviest modes of assault to be ap- 
prehended. It was situated rather on a low ground, with 
a slope ou one side leaning to a plain still lower, and 
surrounded by a lofty wall, the only eutrauce through 
which was a small narrow gateway. In fact it had the 
appearance of a regular little fortress. I afterwards 
found by the public papers, that the elder Mr. P. was, 
at the time the Rockite party suddenly came upon the 
house, outside this gate, and unarmed. Ou seeing them 
approach he ran toward it, and closing it after him, 

* It may be necessary to remark, that this attack on those gentle- 
men, and their manly resistance, is pure history. 



THE ROCKITF.S. 423 

made what haste he could along a narrow straight, pas- 
cage which led directly from it to the back-door of the 
house. This was open. Before he reached it lie heard 
behind him the grating of the blunderbusses against the 
irou railings as the ruffians poked them through to take 
a deliberate aim, and he sprung towards the door. It 
was shut in his face ! The alarm had been given in the 
house. Unconscious of Mr. P's absence, and imagin- 
ing that the assailants had made good their entrance 
into this inner passage, they slapped to the door, and 
left him to the mercy of the men without, or rather of 
their blunderbusses, for these had more than their own- 
ers, and contrived to throw their contents harmlessly all 
around him. Indeed his escape was almost miraculous. 
The door, the panels and jams of which were perfora- 
ted by slugs, so as scarcely to leave a hair's-breadth 
more than the space necessary for his preservation, was 
for a considerable time afterwards an object of intense 
curiosity to numerous visitors. Before the discharge 
could be renewed, however, he was placed beyond its 
reach. The aggressors now (and it was just at this 
juncture the scene presented itself to my sight) retired 
from the gate, and commenced firiug upon the windows. 
Only conceive the impression which such a spectacle 
must have produced on the mind of a stranger, iu the 
deep stillness of a summer noontide, and in a populous 
country where there was something like civilization 
and civil government talked about ! Every man went 
as cooly and openly to work as if the grey frieze on their 
backs had been regular, protected, loyal scarlet, and 
the resisting housekeepers the proscribed men of the 
law. Very soou after, and while the clouds of smoke 
were rolling towards a clump of trees on the south, two 
of the windows were suddenly thrown up, and as sud- 
denly a reciprocal discharge commenced from within. 
The battle now began to wax earnest ; the Rockite* 



4<U THE BOCKITES. 

Bent forth a yell with every discharge, which came over 
the still champagne around with almost a redoubled 
loudness ; and the advantage of the housed warriors 
became quickly apparent. With all the credit for dis- 
cipline which the Rockites have achieved, their mode of 
battle on this occasion was not very imposing : they 
regularly, after discharging a volley irregularly, ran 
down the slope a briglia sciolta, and squatted themselves 
behind a hedge, re-loaded, and re-advanced to the charge 
in any thing bnt marching order. Then, again unbur- 
thening their fire-arms with all the serious silence in the 
world, they again sent forth a shout, and scampered off 
to prepare for a new volley. Only one among them 
seemed to despise this pusillanimous procedure : he ap- 
peared to command the band, and, in fact, did so, as 
was afterwards found ; but he was only distinguished 
from the rest by a white handkerchief tied round his 
hat. He remained during the whole affray in the same 
spot, but he did not continue to expose himself with 
impunity : as his party advanced to the charge for the 
last time, he was in the act of raising his musket, when 
a ball from one of the windows struck him on the arm, 
and the piece fell to the ground ; he instantly tore the 
handkerchief from his hat with his left hand and bound 
it round the other, accompanying every twist with what 
Hotspur lusciously calls " a good mouth-filling oath," 
alternately directed, in a tremendous roar, to his pol- 
troons, as he called them (for they now evidently show- 
ed symptoms of tergiversation, and no very equivocal 
ones,) and to the bandage, which he hid did not find 
ready enough to assist the awkward efforts of the left 
hand. He was the last who left the scene of fight, 
and he walked off sulkily down the slope, and across 
an adjacent bog, trailing his dishonoured musket after 
him. 

Iu a few minutes they all united at the Cross of 



the bociitcs. 425 

Lisnainuck, within rather a scanty distance of the spot 
where I now lay. There were loud voices for a mo- 
ment, and words of reproach exchanged in their vernac- 
ular tongue. Then ensued the silence and sullenness 
of defeat — disgraceful discomfiture ; and they walked 
down the road in a body towards Curra Grove, the 
estate of Sir Aubrey De Vere Hunt, which, during the 
occasional absences of the amiable proprietor, was 
made a frequent place of meeting by those miserably 
misguided creatures. They entered the wood, and I 
lost them 



k DEATH OF PEACE AND A DEATH OF WAR 

.A Dramatic Sketch— Scene, the Empyrean.) 



First Spirit 
How fare you, brother 1 

Second Spirit. 

My sweet sister ! — Why— • 
A something weary and a something sad: — 
I've stooped into the region of the wind, 
A lower flight than those immortal plumes 
Have strength to cleave the heavy air : I peered 
Through a rifted cloud upon our ancient world— 
The pleasant home of our mortality. 
I sighed when I looked on the little spot 
Of earth, where we last parted, never more 
To meet on earth again — and then I laughed 
To see how narrow now appeared the distance— 
We wept to think should he between our gravel i 

First Spirit. 

I found mine soon — Come — rest upon this cloud, 

And £ will tell thee : — What a glorious sight 

Is this around us ! The mist-mountains heave 

Their sullen fronts into the empyrean light. 

And smile, in their despite, against its brightness J 

And from their ever-moving sides fling off 

Fragments of vapour, spreading, like thin veils, 

On the clear ether. These the fair sun-light 

Strikes through, and forms the wonder of the earth— 

The many-coloured covenant of peace 

'Twecn uiun and heaven, whose winged children lov# 

To close their weary wings, and take their rest 

In mid air, on those floating splendours — Ha !— 

How yieldingly this sinks beneath us now ! — 



A DEATH OF PEACE AND A DEATH OF WAR. 427 

it falls — and falls !— and now the clouds of earth 

Are o'er us, and the wide dark world beneath ! — 

Brother, oh ! knowest thou not this soiH — The vale 

That blooms beneath Potosi's Silver Mount — 

A goodly scene is this that lies before us. 

The even fall is pleasant — not a breath 

Of softest wind creepe on the silent leaves — 

Nature seems hushed in rapturous contemplation 

Of her own countless cuarms. — And now — hark ! — list !— 

The distant murmur r$ the town, and sound 

Of convent bells, mingling their faint heard chime 

With the rush of th' ziear rolling Pilcomayo, 

Break on the stillr • A the lonely scene 

So gently, that ' . «ar of solitude 

Scarce notes tl.e .trusion ! — 

So fell the ev of my death ! I pined 

And pined, and burned, and wasted with the fire 

That fed upon my health — until that came, 

And thus it came at length : 



A DEATH OF PEACE. 

The sun of even 
Had looked on me for the last time, (I felt it,) 
And hid his mighty front behind the Mount ; 
And the moonlight was round me, and the air 
Sprinkled its viewless tears upon my oheek 
Till that was chilled ; and my heart's pulse grew ooldei 
And slower, and I felt as I could sleep. 
Our sister was beside me : on her bosom 
I laid my head in weakness — not in fear — 
And looked upon the heaven ; and my lips moved, 
And words came forth of praise and prayer. — The pUia 
Of ether glowed with myriads of those gems 
Of light that darkling mortals love. I gaied, 
With face upturned, until the immensity 
Of space did seem beneath me — not above— 
And prayed to be released : my pain was great— 
I was a weary of my life. — Then felt I 
A sudden hope stir in my breast, my blood 
Throbbed and flowed slowlier and slowlier yet. 
And a cold hand did seem to grasp my heart— 
I knew my prayer was heard, and I sprung forth 
Upon the bosom of the air. — I rose ! 
The light wind bore me up— and onward still- 
Till the wild music of the seraphim 
Was in mine ear, and told me t had found 
Impassible being ! — 

I can now remember, 
When that strange melody had left my hearing, 



428 A DEATH OF PEACE AND A DEATH OF WA*. 

A voice of wailing came from the cold earth ! 
I looked unto the grave which 1 had left — 
The moonlight shone upon a maiden's form 
I had known well once. — O'er her sunken brow 
Her hair hung, and upon her lap and bosom 
A corpse lay, pale and cold — I saw its cheek 
Wet with the tears the living mourner gave 

Second Spirit. 

A waking from a dream of pain and darkness 
To the fair mornlight and the voice of musio, 
Such was thy death ! — It was not so with me. 



A DEATH OF WAR. 

'fliy life was one of evil : the nepenthe 

Of all its sufferings lurked in that dark draught 

The happy shrink to look on — death ! — But mine 

Was full of hope, and joy, and health, and light! 

Thy spirit left its earth within the arms 

Of a loved friend — Mine on the battle field ! — 

Thy bones were shrouded — laid with tears in the eartk 

The mountain winds are shrieking over mine !— 

A warning of long years ma de death to thee 

Unwelcome nor unsought — A summer mora 

Beheld me rise to greet its dawn, in health 

And hope 

Its even smile reddened on my bloodless limbs !— 
It is before me now ! — The flood of time 
Hath torn the scene away in its swift course, 
But left its bed deep channelled in my memory ! 
I hear the clangour of the opposing trumps — 
I hear the tramping of the war steeds' hoofs— 
I see the close array of serried hosts — 
I see the banner waving on the cleft 
Of a rent crag, that crossed the steep asceat 
'Twixt us and freedom's victory. — They meet — 
And shout ! — A thunderpeal had passed unheard 
Above them in the shock. Amid the roar 
Of that wild sea of war, 
I marked the standard where it waved alone, 
Rushed on the cleft — seized thut ; and, with a ory 
Of triumph, spread its blazonry abroad 
Unto the winds above me ! — It was echoed, 
Till the blue vault rang with the sound again, 
And cloud spoke unto cloud of freedom's victory — 
A something struck me then — here — on my front— 
And all was still ! — That pause was nothingness— 
And for a space I was not ! — When I raised 



A DEATH OF PEACE AND A DEATH OF WAR. 429 

Mine eyes again, and thought and life awoke — 

I stood before the judgment-seat ! — 

That scene ! — 

How wonderful it was ! The hush that came 

After that field of fear ! — 

The tinkling of the harps of seraphim, 

The almost noiseless waving of the wings 

Of heaven's bright couriers in their sweeping flight, 

And the calm glory of the Almighty presence — 

Fur mortal hate and strife ! — I had my guerdon 

First Spirit. 

Let us now seek it — singing to our joy, 

Till its rich light is on us onoe again ! 

Tis twilight on the earth — and darkens slowly 



The Tales are wrapt in silence now, 

All but the soft wind's melody, 
And one small stream that, gurgling low, 
Steals under the grey willow tree, 

Lingeringly — lingering ly 
With its timid minstrelsy. 



How sweetly, as we spread our wings 

O'er rooks, and hills, and heather lest, 
The even-wind of the mountain sings, 
And the red West a lustre flings, 

Tremblingly — tremblingly 
Over his own stirless set> 

Second Spirit. 

Come away— away — and on, 

Till our own fair heaven we set- 
Soon the spirit's flight is done, 
Hand in hand looked, let us flee, 
Lovingly — lovingly — 
As it our earthly infancy V*- 



THE GRAVE OF MARION. 



The wind comes whistling o'er the waaU, 

The sand-cloud rises high ; 
Our peril is not wholly past, 

Our foes are pressing nigh. 
A little farther on, my love, 

A little farther on ! 
She does not speak — she does not moro— 

My love at last is gone ! 

1 press thee to my burning breast, 

No blush is on thy brow ; 
These gentle arms that once caress'd, 

Fall round me deadly now ; 
Thy lips have still their hue — but chill 

The spirit of their kiss — 
I lay mine hand upon thine heart, 

Tia cold at last to this ! 

We were young, and closely twined 

Like twin flowers of Love's spring ; 
But one the poison blast has pined, 

And one lives sorrowing ! 
Heart of my heart ! I would I were 

Unloved of thee again — 
I'd leave thee as I met thee, fair, 

And waste in silent pain. 

Were we beneath a Christian heaven, 

Within a Christian land, 
A fairer shrine to thee were given 

Than this bleak bed of sand ; 
Yet thou wert single in thy faith, 

And single in thy worth, 
And thou shouldst die a lonely death. 

And lie in lonely earth ! 

And now I've laid thee to thy rest, 

My last look now is given — 
The sand is smooth above thy breast. 

And mine is still unriven : 
No winding-sheet — no matins meet 

Thy perished love can have — 
But a lover's sighs embalm thy corta, 

A lover's tears thy grave ! 



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W, J. KKNKDY, Excelsior Catholto PubUaMa* 
Bouse, & Barclay Btrr*t^ jiew York, 



SEP -8 194 



0*. 



Deacidified using the Bookkeeper process. 
Neutralizing agent: Magnesium Oxide 
Treatment Date: April 2009 

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